Moments in Time
by ThunderStorm-8
Summary: A tale of various moments in our heros' lives. M/S Kid/Liz BS/Tsubaki
1. Fuck your Symmetry

A little introduction: the current time line is three years after the Noah's Book incident in the manga or the Arachane Battle in the Anime. In this story I'll be incorporating things from both the manga and the anime in their entirety-including some parts of the odd final episode, but I won't spoil that for you just yet. Thus said, I encourage you to read/watch all the soul Eater currently available on the off chance I ruin something or you. Very sorry if I do!

*.*.*.*

1:

Death mansion was magnificent. Grandeur fit for a prince, as it was no doubt built intentionally that way. It suited him Liz thought as she sat by Patty's bedside, stroking her sister's fluffy blonde hair. A grim shadow overpowered the gleam in her eyes that would have sparkled down at the younger Thompson any other night.

Tonight those big blue eyes were cold, empty, and unmoving.

She and Patty use to gloat and dream about living in luxury like this, and it was Kid who made those dreams real. However…Liz checked Patty's dressings for a third time, glaring helplessly at the slice in her sister's forearm…he was also the one who put her little sister in harms way tonight.

"Fuck your symmetry…"

She'd promised her, hadn't she? Hadn't she damn well promised that if nothing else she would never let Patty be hurt, sad, or alone?

Liz heaved a breath as she turned over and over in her head what she needed to do. Eventually gave in to her own fatigue and lay down next to the lightly snoring lump with its legs already twisted childishly in the sheets.

Something had to change.

She'd put up with his OCD obscurities for too long.

Most of the time it was harmless enough, just delaying them in their missions or forcing her to spend an entire weekend measuring and moving the furniture. A small price to pay for the home, friends—even care, she guiltily admitted—that Kid gave them in return. Never had his habits really put them in any harm. Not really. It was always_ his_ body that took the beating when he stood frozen on the battlefield, _his_ life that got pummeled away as he refused to fight because of some ridiculous geometric coincidence.

But not tonight.

Tonight his shenanigans had thrown Patty into harm, not fatal but still…

It had to stop.

He would either change somehow—she would change him—or she would find a new Meister.

*.*.*.*

Next chapter will be longer. Also, I will re-categorize the "two characters" this story is about to reflect the couple that dominates the most RECENT chapter.

Thank you for reading!


	2. To be relaxed

The longer chapter as promised. M/S

*.*.*.*

2.

Soul resonance was a powerful thing. For the Shibusen Students it was their most essential weapon against insanity and otherwise matchless enemies. Sometimes it brought you closer to your partner than could be explained by words, even after careful contemplation and various excursions with the dictionary.

Only the most complementary Technicians and Weapons could summon truly magnificent results through resonance, and yet somehow, despite the black blood and their otherwise opposing wavelengths Soul and Maka honed one of the strongest resonances every boasted by students of Shibusen.

Maybe it was their bond as friends, maybe it was the way Maka constantly experimented with recreating their battle strengths in everyday life, or maybe it was just because they fit so well together.

Every time they achieved something different, something more powerful—like the evolution of witch hunter to demon hunter—Maka carefully documented and picked apart the situation.

If she looked at it analytically maybe a pattern would appear, a key to unlocking the next step, and everything that came after. Their potential could be limitless.

However, sometimes post-mission study and post-mission wind down clashed violently—like tonight, when she and Soul came home covered in what could only be described as "goop" and had to battle it out over who got the bath first.

Of course Soul won with the argument; "But I don't take a damn _hour_ in there!"

She couldn't deny it, but sulked anyway at the thought of waiting the ten or so minutes he would spend in the shower.

Deciding she could feel sorry for herself and undress at the same time Maka stuck her tongue out at the closed door and turned on her heal.

In her room Maka's characteristic battle uniform slithered to the floor as she slipped out of the coat, skirt, and dress shirt with a small, disgruntled wiggle. If she could just get everything off without any more of the ooze touching her face again she would be a happy camper. Abused clothes hit the polished wood with a wince worthy slosh and plop.

A quick glance at the lengthy mirror tacked across the room convinced the wiry technician that her undergarments hadn't suffered the same treatment, and comfortable in her own skin Maka left it alone.

The latest tune Soul insisted on playing again and again came humming from her throat as Maka thumbed through the stack of books on her bedside table, looking for the journal she kept detailing their battles and progress. Tonight's performance was one of those special cases that just had to be turned up, around, down, and a dissected.

Even though Soul was a Death Scythe now they still had a long way to go if he was going to contend with her father, who was still the most powerful weapon at Lord Death's disposal.

She'd just put pen to paper when the rough cry of "YOUR TURN!" pierced through the wall.

Maka didn't hesitate to carry her notes with her as she sprinted for the bathroom. She turned the water on high and scrubbed hard.

When she was sure every last slimy residue had been scrubbed off Maka switched the water flow from the pressure nozzle to fill their Japanese style bathtub.

The water rose quickly, giving her just enough time to grab some bath salt and drag the little desk over. Hot water came slowly around her ankles, already soothing the tension of the day. Sinking into the fizzy spa inch by inch was heaven on earth. Getting to work _and _soak at the same time was just pure delicious.

Ox helped her craft the little desk to hang neatly over the tub, providing a nice try place for Maka's journal. She'd lost almost thirty pages from water damage when the idea struck her. Now it was one of her greatest luxuries.

Soaked in the warm tub; relaxed, clean, and writing careful notes she realized how similar it was to Resonance with Soul.

To her, Resonance felt just like a warm, welcoming bath. Once you strip away the rush of adrenaline and the importance of battle that's all it really was. Being so comfortable with your partner that you could withdraw from the world, give them a piece of your soul, and create a new world with what they gave you in return.

The end of the pencil fell under mild abuse as she chewed and pondered. How many other places could she find this feeling of total comfort? How could she bring Soul into it?

Reason interrupted, shooting red into her cheeks and reminding her that having Soul in the tub would not only make it very crowded but very embarrassing.

"Maybe…swimsuits?" A hot tub? That seemed to calm her again.

What could she do with Soul, with cloths…

It was much later when Maka found her answer.

Hair still dripping lightly at the ends where the water pooled and a white towel around her neck, the petite technician shuffled to the living room for some after-bath milk. In her little scientist brain she was making a conscious effort to stay relaxed. Noting what set off her worries and anxieties and avoiding them.

So far her only two complaints turned out to be tiny bras and dental floss.

Through the milky rim of the glass she spotted her white haired weapon on the couch, sprawled childishly with a leg on the armrest and another on the floor.

She smiled thinking of how much he'd grown, wondering if she should look into investing in a larger piece of furniture for him.

Quietly Maka came towards her partner, cautiously, slowly placed her arm over his. She waited, heart thrumming so noisily in her ears it made it had to listen for any chance in his light snoring. Soul didn't move an inch.

'He must be so tired...'

Tonight's opponent had been tough, she admitted. That's why such a strong resonance was needed, and she supposed why they sent Death the Kid and his partners along. Not that they'd been that much help…None of them even got the least bit slimy since they'd been too busy dealing with Kid's insane incapacities and Patty's injury to fight.

'Ah! There we go…stress.'

Incompetence, another bullet poised to shoot down her great mood.

Rather than think about how Kid reacted to the witch's symmetrical lair she shifted against Soul's arm, concentrated on the sound of his breathing and the wonderful way that being close to him, lying against him, made her completely and irreversibly comfortable.

So comfortable she wanted to drop into sleep then and there, never bothering with insomnia again.

And why shouldn't she?

She was his Meister after all.

She could do whatever she pleased with him, to him, and Soul would—usually—play along. It was an interesting thought to consider, but manipulating him so forcefully wasn't her style.

Exhaling through her nose, her restful mood deflated, Maka realized she should get up and go to her own bed. Restless, her eyes flickered upward, lingering over the face of her Weapon. She could feel her resolve to leave slip away as she studied him. A face she'd memorized years ago seemed like a stranger for this one moment. Had he always been this beautiful? No, maybe beautiful really wasn't the word.

Maka chuckled silently. Definitely not beautiful.

But he _was _very handsome, and strange. Dangerous to everyone but her. She could see just a tease of the sharp teeth behind his wide mouth, and knew with absolute certainty they posed no threat. Big green eyes trailed down the messy white hair, grazed the strong jaw, finally settled on the lean, outstretched neck.

Her mind jumped to thoughts of the novel she just finished and wondered if a real boy's neck would smell as good as it was described.

Those thoughts must have lulled her off. When Soul woke an hour later as the clock struck a noisy twelve it baffled him to find his Meister sleeping on his arm. The tingling and needles that pricked him from the lack of circulation had spilled over into his dreams, bringing images of a fierce, tiny creature trying to eat his arm off.

Soul eyed his sleeping technician thoughtfully, avoiding the free view where her shirt skipped a button and cursed her deeply for not wearing a bra.

With just as much effort as she'd put into sneaking to him Soul eased smoothly upward from the couch, drawing her into his arms. Carefully he cradling Maka's neck with his conscious hand till he could set her steady on his shoulder.

He wanted to think that she'd grown just as much as he had but the obvious imbalance in their weight told him otherwise. Soul Evans remembered a time when lifting his Meister great task, but that was when they were children.

Children they technically still were, but now he had a good foot on her and the training with Black Star filled out some of his gangly limbs.

Now, carrying Maka from the living room to her bed wasn't what he'd call difficult.

It was his luck, of course, that she would stir _just_ as he set her on the pillows, her arms encircling his neck, pulling at him like she wanted him to….well, like she wanted him.

Throwing back a gulp, Soul briefly tried to explain. "You feel asleep on the floor."

"Hm…" Her reply was thick with sleep and reminded him of the way Blair purred after a bottle of sake.

Still Maka tugged at him.

"…should I…stay?" Gingerly he tipped the question, his expression a mixture of wariness and self-conscious surprise.

"I'm doin' an experiment." The last tug and the dreamy green of her eyes sealed his fate.

An exasperated sigh drifted off into the dark room. "Alright then."

Obediently Soul settled in next to her, wondering if he'd end up on the floor the next morning because of the size of the bed and her ability kick him away in horror sometime in the night.

Duty. He thought. It was his duty to follow her request and oblige her…experiments.

The next morning Maka woke to the familiar scent of her Weapon and the misty blue light of very early hours.

Giving into a stretch she couldn't fight Maka sprawled a moment across his long legs, careful not to knock his head with her elbows.

After getting the little crust from her eyes she saw him clearly. In that moment she was reminded again of how handsome he was, and got just a bit of satisfaction knowing that no other girl in Shibusen had ever woken up with him this way.

Still riding the mental calm she shifted her weight slowly, brought her forehead to his and offered her half of Resonance.

Maka felt his soul flicker in response; trying to reach out for her even as his mind slept, gradually the spark grew to a dull flame until at last the unmistakable surge of power—more like a thousand tiny wings than the swirling hurricane it became in battle—met her in the middle.

"Mmm…"

Maka broke the resonance before that groan became a wide toothy yawn, but the power lingered, humming inside her body. After half an hour of lying with her eyes closed and no sleep Maka realized the energy she'd just ignited wasn't about to go away.

She would lie quietly until Soul woke, knowing if she got up now he'd be just as disturbed as she was, and that wasn't really fair.

The next few hours she wanted the sunrise and briefly played with the idea that out there somewhere was a way to measure Resonance. Not just by guess work and impressive surges of power but with actual numbers, data and facts.

What a revolution that would bring! The possibilities for training would become endless, and customized for every couple.

"I'll ask Stein…" Yawning her thoughts Maka felt the power begin to wane at last, and with a quiet exhale she drifted off.

Seven hours later Maka got that chance as class paused for lunch.

"Professor Stein!"

"Eh?" The white haired, mostly harmless, lunatic adjusted his head screw with one hand as the other picked up test papers.

"I was wondering…" She started, eyes full of expectations and questions. "If there was a device that measured Resonance?"

"The wavelengths of it?"

"Yes! You know, judging the power, stability, that sort of thing."

"Ah…" Stein seemed to ponder this a minute, then cranked out another adjustment one the screw before he swiveled in his chair and motioned her to follow.

The smile on Maka's lips reached well into her eyes as she went along, quite accustomed to and even endeared by the oddity that was Professor Stein.

Maka wondered if they would have to go all the way back to his home, but Stein took a turn down one of the corridors usually labeled "off limits," and they walked that way for at least five more minutes.

He led her past a handful of high security doors, disarming various traps and triggers. It got so almost comically excessive Maka began to wish she'd brought Soul for extra protection. It would be just like Stein to forget about something like a huge rolling ball of death.

At the fourth door Stein stopped, drew a ball of spirit energy to the tip of his finger and used it like a key.

The metal door swung open as though someone opened it from inside, but the only thing in the room were boxes of clutter and haphazard looking junk.

Maka raised an eyebrow at all this, hopeful that at least one of these obviously discarded gadgets would help her.

Meanwhile Stein dug his arms deep into one of the dusty cases. A moment later produced a small green device that looked like the love child of a barometer and a pacemaker.

"This was something I fiddled with back when your parents were making you." He blew a whiff of smoke from the cigarette as he spoke, charmingly unacquainted with maternity terms. "It measures soul wavelength, here—" He flipped a switch and the dial spun rapidly three times before settling down at zero. "—that's the power. It runs on batteries." Stein handed the device to Maka, watched her eyes light up and saw the thoughts whirl through her brain. He wasn't really sure why—probably from love and an unknown sense of parental pride—Stein set a hand on her head as if she weren't seventeen but still the child he scared senseless three years earlier.

"I'm sure you can change it to suit your interests."

"Thanks…" Her eyes skimmed the device like a lazar scanner, taking in the retro details, the dials and metric format. "Why were you making this? Looks like we don't really use it in class…"

"Curiosity." Another puff of tobacco. "And your father was anxious to see how strong his daughter was."

The light and love flaring in the young girls eyes compelled Stein to tell her more.

"We got it so sensitive it could monitor you when you hadn't even been born."

"Wow."

Maka was about to delve into more science-y questions when an announcement came crackling over the loud speakers.

"Maka Alburn, Death the Kid and partners please come to Shinigami-sama's office."

The message repeated as Maka bid Stein goodbye and thanks and ran off to see what new assignment lay in store for their team.

Even at her fast pace Maka still couldn't beat Kid and the girls.

They looked fully recovered after the previous night's scuffle; Kid as stoic as ever, Patty bouncing energetically along to the tune of the indoor clouds—apparently unfazed by her little injury—and Liz with her regular expression of total boredom.

"Hey!"

"Afternoon."

"Hi hi!"

Liz didn't answer, still staring at the ground, and for a moment Maka saw the dark cloud in her eyes and the stress on her temples.

Before Maka could pry Liz recovered, smiling with that kind but sassy way that only a New Yorker could pull off. "Oh hey."

Soul joined them a minute later, taking his sweet time to walk with as much "coolness" projecting as possible.

"Hi everyooooone." Lord Death called happily to his star pupils. "Unfortunately I've got some difficult work for you all so soon after your last job, but this is important. Two souls we assume to be connected to the Kishin have been causing trouble lately…I want you to follow and gather information, then bring them back alive."

You could almost hear the determination fizzling in the air like deadly electric currents.

"Maka, Soul, I want you to go after Henry the VIII in England, Kidd, Patty and Liz will hunt down Columbus in South America.

"Yes sir!" Rang the voices of all five students.

If there was one thing that could make them all throw aside personal troubles and objectives it was the goal of taking down Kishin once and for all.

*.*.*.*

Chapter three will be up soon.


	3. The promise of leaving

Thanks to the people who enjoy the story so far! Remember to read n review and I'll love you all.

*.*.*.*

3.

Finding the twisted soul of the legendary explorer wasn't difficult. Though his actions were hardly as obvious as the Kishin eggs tended to be he was still a murderous demon now, much like he'd been in life, and the aura from that kind of being left a cookie trail for the Shinigami and his weapons.

Soaring high on Beelzebub, Liz in his right hand Patty in his left, Kid followed that sickly scent to a tiny village off the Panama Canal.

The night was well lit but still dangerously dark, and though it shouldn't have been very late there wasn't a single light on.

"Kid…" Liz could feel the heebie-jeebies creeping up on her even as Kid held her in gun form. She desperately wished they could have done this during the day. Why, why did they always have to battle scary things in the_ dark_?

But her Meister's eyes were already scanning the area with cool, deadly intent. He would find this monster, question the very soul from him, and bring back anything and everything useful to his father. Kishin had been on the loose far too long, spreading his insanity and causing pain.

They couldn't go one by one searching houses that belong to living people, so Kid closed his eyes just a moment, honing his senses, sharpening the Resonance.

Eyes still shut he saw the incoming attack like a neon arrow of energy and dodged just in time.

Fully alert and ready for battle Kid let loose an answering barrage, just enough to daze his opponent if the mark hit like it should.

Surprise that didn't have time to bruise Kid's ego accompanied the thousand-year-old demon as he stepped from jungle unscathed.

"You're working for the Kisin?" The young shinigami raised his guns, eyes full of threat and fingers of bloodlust.

The warrior chuckled. "So it's true, and the once great Shinigami sends this little fragment hence to do his bidding."

A vein twitched in Kid's temple, ready to burst as he filled Liz and Patty with wavelength and fired off a vicious round. "I've had enough of all this 'fragment' nonsense!"

The bullets ricocheted off some unseen armor but tore way the ridiculous fur clock, exposing the conqueror's secret defense.

A defense that would prove more deadly to Kid than Columbus could have known.

The armor worn by the demon bore an intricate design, two identical lion heads, facing inward, their long regal tails swirling around them, becoming part of a greater design that perfectly mirrored the partnering side.

It was masterfully symmetrical.

The familiar sparkle in his golden eyes brought a glaze over, and Liz found more fear in that look that in the eerily abandoned village.

Columbus charged, but Kid didn't care.

"Uuuuuh-oh…" Even Patti knew this episode spelled trouble.

'Kid…god damn it…'

Liz hadn't slept more than four hours, and all day her mind was plagued by indecision and the torment in her heart. That it had already come to this was like a blow to a freshly sutured wound.

She had to break him of this, snap him out of it, she hadn't accepted yet in her heart that she could leave him.

As she watched the warped human take his spear again and again to Kid, who only bothered to dodge the pointy end as he admired the flawless design on the demon's chest plate, Liz knew this was an opportunity she couldn't miss.

"KID! Forgot about that damn plate! You have to fight!"

He didn't seem to care, the slightly maniacal grin on his face moving as if giving himself a silent lecture.

A loud crack, Liz winced, and Death fell to the ground with what would be a grand bruise the next morning.

"Fight him!" She pulled his own wavelength from him, charging the ammo herself to encourage him. 'All you have to do is pull the trigger!'

Kid only moved to get a better angle.

All the while Columbus cackled with true enjoyment, and Liz was sure she could count on him to simply toy with her Meister for a little while longer.

"Isn't your life more important than symmetry? Isn't finding the Kishin more important than symmetry?"

Another blow to the gut.

"You're suppose to become the one and only Death! Are you gunna loose to a chest plate?"

A crack at his skull, the blood was running now.

"KID!"

Their enemy turned his weapon, a flame of masochism in his eyes that could have made even Stein shiver.

"Stand up you-!"

The spear lodged into the corner of his shoulder, piercing skin and bone.

"—you moron!"

Was that the sound of his shoulder dislocating? Oh god…

Fear, hot, chilling and suffocating grabbed Liz by the heart and shook her. He really wouldn't die here, would he? He wouldn't take this much longer…Would he?

Another stab through his side, splitting the skin and nicking a rib.

Kid coughed blood and staggered just a little, coming closer to regaining control over his thoughts than Liz could realize.

All she saw was the weapon raised high, the bloody tip coming down, and suddenly the whole world was a blur.

"Aaaah!"

Something obscured the view of the fascinating artifact, his thoughts cleared with pain and reason but the first and only thing he could process was the sight of Liz grabbing Columbus's spear in her own two hands, struggling with the towering demon like a fly might struggle against a tarantula. In one swift movement the warped soul ripped his weapon from her fingers and struck her so hard that her small body went flying.

Now it was Kid's world became a blur, drenched in red.

"PATTY! DEATH CANNON!"

He aimed for the neck, fired a round, and the conflict was over in seconds. Ignoring the red soul left floating in the enemy's place he ran to Liz.

He'd seen Soul do it a thousand times, leap to his Meister's rescue, become her shield rather than her weapon. But not once during all the times he'd frozen in battle had Patty or Liz done the same.

Kid would have run her over if he hadn't been able to stop so precisely. His fingers, perfectly balanced with their identical rings, trembled as he reached for her shoulder, nudging her to face him.

So why now?

Blood gushed from her head and she lay as still as if she were…

Why did it end up like this?

"Liz…."

Her younger sister's cries of the same were like white noise that didn't even translate in his ears.

Why…Because of...of what...symmetry?

Lifting the woman into his arms he clung to her, shouting at Patty to call Shinigami and get help.

His own wounds stung bitterly and throbbed more blood onto them both as he held his weapon closely.

FUCK SYMMATY!

Stein was just finishing up when Kid knocked on the door. They'd been taken to the Shibusen Nursing Station as there wasn't a hospital in Death City yet, though there really should have been.

He would see to building one immediately…after this.

By the solemn look Kid wore Stein could tell what the young shinigami wanted to know.

"She'll be fine." He swiveled in his chair and adjusted that depraved screw of his.

Only a fraction of the young Reaper's tension dissolved.

Kid scanned the room for the source of emptiness he couldn't escape. "Patty?" 

"Ah…I sent her home..." A long drag from a cigarette—that couldn't be healthy for his patient—formed a pause Kid didn't feel like waiting through.

"She was tired, wasn't she?"

Stein just nodded as he blew out the puff.

"Then I suggest the same for yourself. I'll stay and monitor the situation." He pulled a chair beside the unconscious and bandaged Liz. "You'll hear from me if anything goes…If anything happens."

He wasn't expecting the large hand on his shoulder—bandaged as well—and winced through his surprise.

The nod he got from Stein didn't satisfy him an answer, and he never got one as the albino adult kicked his chair through the door and went on to do other Steiny things.

"Things could get interesting with that boy…I wonder…"

As the clock struck one AM noisily down the long, empty halls of the school Liz began to stir. She shifted, expecting to be in her own bed on her own fluffy pillows, but hissed through her teeth when she felt slippery vinyl and pain instead.

"Fuck…" She opened an eye cautiously and found three fuzzy moons staring at her. This wasn't good, she was seeing triple.

"Stein?" Her voice felt hoarse but she couldn't fathom why. Maybe it was from all the screaming earlier.

Her unease settled when she noticed that two of the golden moons were so much closer than the third, and not laughing manically.

Focus…

No, they were too golden.

"Kid?" Her hand brushed away some of the stay hair that caught in her eyes, and when a cold hand skimmed her temples—assisting—she knew for sure that those two shinning orbs belonged to her Meister.

He looked like stone, perfectly still except the one hand extended to help her.

"Your shoulder-" A cough hitched in her throat and had her heaving violently for a moment as she fumbled for the water on the table.

Just as before a pair of silent hands reached out to help. One snatched the cup, the other caught her, held her, and all the while those heartstring eyes stared into her.

She kept his gaze, perchance to stare him down or at least intimidate him into give some form of explanation.

When the glass lowered from her lips she choked one last time on "You don't have to do that."

Her words seemed to do more damage than good.

His gaze shifted away, he set the glass cautiously, soundlessly, away, and simply stared at his lap as he laid the woman back down.

Liz was suddenly reminded of Patty, how she could sulk so perfectly at times to get what she wanted and realized that Kid was feigning the same. Not in his usual "I'm not perfect, this isn't perfect" way, but with such a great sadness it almost made her weep to watch him.

"Hey." Her hand covered his; perfectly accustomed to the chill she felt from it, but not nearly so acquainted with the look of shock, torment, and inner pain she saw when he finally looked at her—into her.

His lips parted, mouth moved futilely once, then blurted out the strangest thing she'd ever heard from the child of Death.

"Forgive me…"

The tightness around her fingers, the rash way he brought them to his temple, the uneasy sight of him crumbled over her bed, it was all so new.

"Forgive me…"

It wouldn't be the first time she saw him cry but Liz somehow doubted he would.

She wanted nothing more than to reach out and stroke his uneven hair, draw him close and breath in his scent.

But Liz's eyes became like stone, and she took a broom to those mothering instincts, sweeping them into the closet.

"No."

The cold words hung in air like a dagger, poised to fall and cut wherever it fell.

Slowly Kid lifted his head, his golden eyes trembling more than his hands or his lips.

Because she couldn't look at him she looked out the window.

"You did this…and the other day, to Patty, you put her in harms way…You did this, so fix it." Gathering all her strength and vile thoughts like she would have done so easily on the streets of New York Liz forced herself to stare directly into his eyes as she delivered the final blow.

"Fix it, or we'll find another Meister."

"…Liz…"

She almost choked again, not from the dust in her throat but the ache in her heart.

"I don't care if you cut every blade of grass by hand at home…but if you loose yourself in battle on more time…I…I just can't…"

'I can't let anything happen to Patty.' 'I can't watch that one more time…' Those two phrases battled in her mind, and in the end she couldn't decide.

So she left it at that.

Those were the words she gave him three years ago.

Three years, he thought, and not a single slip up. Not until now.

*.*.*.*

dun dun dun


	4. Resonance work

4.

From the sound of Kid's report his mission hadn't gone as smoothly as her own, and while Maka felt sorry for her comrade her head was just a little too full of her new pet project to worry about what the outcome meant for the future.

For now.

Just one more hour, then she'd worry about it.

…Maybe an hour and a half.

Yes. She would work on this for just two more hours and that was **it**.

A brief sigh pushed through Maka's grim look of concentration, and because she nearly caught herself spinning 180 in the wheeled chair she got up, stretched, and ordered her brain to think about something else.

It was all wonderfully theoretical, but she just didn't know how to apply that to a machine. Even after studying the flow of energy the SWM—Soul Wavelength Monitor, as she'd named it—she still didn't know how to convert it to measure Resonance.

"Tomorrow I'll ask Ox, maybe BJ…"

A bath seemed like a great way to get her mind of such a problem, but just before she got to the middle button in her blouse the crisp notes of Soul's electric keyboard, set to classical piano, interrupted that thought.

Like a ghost drawn to the haunting Maka followed the music to his room where the instrument was kept.

When he first bought it she wanted to let it stay in the living room but her partner countered that if he "left something that delicate in the living room we could never have Black Star over again."

She'd also wanted him to get a real piano but he just smirked and said they'd have to rent a larger place.

So deep in his music, hands on the keyboard, a pen between two fingers and another in his ear, Soul didn't realize Maka's entrance. Didn't acknowledge her for another five minutes till he turned to look for a hair tie and found her watching intently from his own bed.

Because the sight was a little more than he was prepared for Soul beat back his first thoughts with a sharp stick and asked as calmly and coolly as possible. "Like it?"

"It's wonderful. Is it for dancing?" 

"Why?" He chuckled and flicked one of the crumpled up sheet music at her. "Does it make you want to?"

Her response was to flop onto the mattress and let out a dissatisfied "huff." "Yes but you know I can't…"

"Can too." Soul's red eyes had taken a glossy turn towards the outstretched figure on the bed, _his _bed, and wondered if she was making a conscious effort to torture him.

She turned to him, laughing, and teased back with something he didn't quite catch.

"Ah..."

The beauty of her smile disappeared, her head tilted this time in concern, and when she went to him, asking if he was alright, he pulled her in by the waist, held tight.

"Soul?"

An excuse was already at the tip of his tongue, but Soul couldn't help but sip and enjoy this moment he'd stolen. He wanted to drown, but as things stood now all he could do was taste.

After brief consideration Maka decided he must be tired and mildly incoherent, and the smile that followed would have knocked his socks off.

Cupping his head in her hands she ran one set of fingers through his hair, petting the white locks and soothing away the hard nights work.

Maka realized she hadn't spoken to Soul about the things she'd discovered yet. That morning had been too busy with running around and scrambling over toast and book bags to entertain the leisurely conversation the topic deserved.

"Soul?" She repeated, this time saying his name without the surprise or concern but still just as pressing.

"Hm?" Came the mumbled response through her shirt.

"What does resonance feel like to you?"

"Like this…" He really was drifting off now and she heard it in his voice.

"Yeah?" Maka couldn't help the excitement at the small confirmation of her theory.

"Well, remember last nigh?"

She heard a sound like a proud scoff, and took it as an invitation to briefly explain what she'd done.

His neck could have snapped with the speed he used to look up at her, searching for a hint of joke in her green eyes. "You Resonated with me...in my _sleep_?"

"Yup." His Meister's bright smile told him she was oblivious to the shock and tingly sense of invasion her statement brought him. Though after a few gears started ticking curiosity swarmed him.

"How?"

"I'm not positive yet. I think it's because Resonance isn't just something…well, I don't really know how to put it. It's something you feel, not just in battle but anywhere you're comfortable. Meaning you don't have to be mentally aware of it, your soul just has to recognize the attempt." Now she did look slightly apologetic. "That's why I didn't tell you…I wanted to know how much of Resonance is mental and how much of it is just pure energy and feelings."

Arms still loosely circling his neck, Maka went on to explain the little machine Stein gave her to tinker with, how she was having trouble applying her theories to a physical, measurable form while Soul watched her intently, offering input on his experiences with the Black Room and little ogre. Reminding her that when the demon offered them more power he didn't always accept it in the calmest of moods.

"That's just it though—" A yawn interrupted, queuing her partner that it was time to detach and set her to bed. Neither technician nor weapon realized it had come to be the earliest of AM till now.

"Yeah, yeah." His grip on her sides tightened a moment as he stood up, half for leverage, half for his own mental sake.

Grinning at her now from a foot above Soul grudgingly released his grip as her hands slid off his shoulders, down his arms, to rest at his wrists.

If things didn't change soon he just might go insane.

"Don't forget to set your alarm."

"Yeah." 'It would be so much easier if I could just wake up to yours again.'

*.*

Half an hour later, when Soul heard the light snoring of Maka deep in dreams he snuck quietly in, knelt beside his Meister's bed, took her small, sturdy hands and tried the same.

*.*.*.*

All morning Maka had an unexplainable surge of energy. The light felt crisper, the air smelled better, school was just too slow and she ended up studying three books while her left ear listening to the lecture. Her low appetitive at lunch had Tsubaki a little concerned, but Maka just laughed and said she was feeling great.

Soul, meanwhile, seemed just a little more out of it than usual, as if his mind was working overtime on some new song.

The good mood continued with her all the way till the end of lunch when a perky little black rain cloud had to come and trample on it.

A group of girls were cluttered around Soul's locker, no doubt stuffing love notes and weapon requests between the cracks. Proudly she walked past them to her own cubby, determined not to let the daggers and jealous glares on her back ruin her day.

Feeling powerful as she strutted past the girls with their frilled, laced, or otherwise modified uniforms Maka considered the event well handled…until she heard the whispered criticisms designed for her ears.

"You know, if _my _weapon we really hot I'd put a lot more effort into looking nice."

Someone giggled. "You always look nice."

Maka rolled her eyes, groupies for groupies.

"Yeah…you wouldn't wanna look unbalanced! It's gross when one partner is a babe and the other's not."

"EW! Like poor Tsubaki-sama…having to put up with that mountain gorilla."

Temper ready to flair, Maka bit back the defiant screams, knowing that if she acknowledged them it would just be their victory. And there was no way she would loose to such incapable bimbos who only wanted her weapon's dick.

Still, though she didn't want to admit it the damage had been done.

Her mood was gone and doubt was swimming in her head.

That thundering atmosphere stayed with her long after class ended, after she missed dinner working with Ox and BJ, and long into the evening when she'd finally gone home.

Soul winced as he watched her slam the refrigerator shut and chug down a glass of milk like she was at war with it.

When she marched into Blair's room he knew beyond a doubt something was wrong.

The temptress cat lived with them on and off, most likely spending her time away in the company of wealthy suitors or amusing herself with the Chupacabra Girls, but came back when she was feeling lonely for them or wanted a break. And so a good chunk of her clothing resided permanently in the big closet where she slept in cat form.

"Maka…" His voice was both a warning and inquiry, as he'd had plenty practice approaching her in these fits of discontent. That was all he knew, that disapproval for something in her life was rolling off her in buckets.

Warily he rounded the corner, found his Meister tearing off her cloths and stumbled backwards into the living room with a painful 'thud'.

"Damn it Maka!"

She didn't hear him or didn't care, as the wiry girl went right on plowing through the rows of cloths, pulling out this or that, scrutinizing a long black thing, tossing aside anything that sparkled even the slightest.

With an armload of the stuff in a disheveled heap Maka marched to her own room, threw the hasty selection on the ground and kicked the door closed with her heel.

Figuring it would be safer to stay on this side, Soul settled against the door and tried again, still flushed and a mite bit sour.

"Oy, what's gotten into you?"

"Absa**fucking**lootly_ nothing_!"

"Doesn't really sound like nothing." He answered, forcing some innocence into his voice in an attempt to make her laugh.

There was no laugh.

"…should I get Tsubaki?" His voice went a pitch higher with uncertainty.

"NO!"

'Wrong move…'

Frustrated, Soul racked a hand through his hair, told himself he was a man by thunder and grabbed the handle.

"If you're naked it's your own fault."

Swinging the door wide Soul walked briskly into the room, hoping for momentary blindness, but found his Meister safely wrapped in the long black number he'd caught earlier.

It was much too big for her but she'd set a belt under her minimal cleavage, cinching the fabric to accent her hips though the length and depth of the neckline were still way off.

"Mind if I ask what you think you're doing?" He leaned nonchalantly against the doorway, arms folded and one white eyebrow caught in an invisible fishhook.

"Is it that weird when I dress like a girl?"

The pout in her eyes didn't escape or faze him.

His sour, concerned, prying, and damn it gorgeous red eyes had her sighing a huff and explaining.

"I hate the way people look at us at school! What nerve, what right do they have to say I'm not good enough?"

"Who says that?" All but the concern and a rising anger left Souls face.

"Your stupid fangirls. They just want to jump your damn bones! They don't care how-how obnoxious you are to feed or how nerve wrecking it is not knowing when you'll try and throw yourself in harms way…" Her green eyes lifted from her pitiful attempt to fit in Blair's nice cloths and she began to feel the fatigue she'd been too happy and too pissed to acknowledge the rest of the day.

The look on her partner's face was one of genuine interest. How many girls wanted to jump his bones? But to her mild delight it changed into a reconsidering that had him almost wincing at the thought. Whatever he'd suddenly thought of it gave her a strange sense of victory to know it was at least less appealing than she was.

Maka took a moment to look around the room at the mess she'd caused, sheepish now and ashamed to be wearing something that slit practically to her belly button.

She thought about tidying it all up but Soul was still glued to the door, red eyes half on her half on nothing, but if she bent down now…

She turned a fraction away, hands on the belt to undo it, hoping he might take the hint that she would soon be indecent again and if he wanted to avoid the pain he should leave now.

It wasn't his guitar calloused fingers she expected to fell brush the little bit of skin on her abdomen the dress exposed, hadn't planned on him undoing the belt for her before turning his back, her night shirt dangling nonchalantly from the other hand though she couldn't imagine how he'd snatched it up without her noticing.

When he heard the sound of rustling clothe die down he turned again, noting how the ends would have stopped just short of her bottom if the plaid shorts didn't cover up everything. He tugged downward on those shorts, just a bit; stepping into her space like it might as well have been his own.

"You realize I don't care what those kids say, what they promise in their letters or what they stuff their bras with."

Maka was perfectly at ease though every novel or movie she'd ever read or watched was trying to remind her she should be quacking and shivering as the tips of his thumbs rubbed whispers along her legs.

"I realize…" She answered slowly.

"And it still bothers you?"

"They have a point. We're kinda off balance."

"Oh?" With the tilt of his head a white wave of hair came into his eyes, but she wasn't looking there. She was too focused on the hints of him she got through his shirt, the tone and lean bulges that drove most girls crazy.

"Well you're all…_you._" Maka gestured, exasperated. "and I'm…" Looking down at her barely existence cleavage—that had swelled at least one cup size in the last few years, _thank you_—and all her pep melted away.

"What's wrong with you?"

Her eyes almost filled with tears of appreciation and self-loathing, instead she laughed. "Oh come on Mr. Tiny tits, isn't it you who said no guy could go for a girl like me?"

He didn't smile.

Maka was almost sure Soul was coming closer somehow, slowly suffocating her, driving her crazy.

She couldn't afford to go crazy just yet.

Letting a puff of air through her cheek as she looked around for dramatic effect at the cloths on the floor Maka pulled away from his hands. "Well, sorry 'bout the mess. I'll clean up in the morning. Goodnight Soul."

"You're beautiful, you know that?"

Body hit pillows with a rush of air escaping through feathers and casing. One arm shielded her hands from the light fixture above, and for a moment Soul wasn't sure he'd said the right thing, but her other arm lifted, reaching for him. "Turn off the light?"

"I feel an 'and' coming." He said through a triumphant smirk.

"And come here." She finished once the light died.

*.*.*.*

more comin'


	5. Obediance and Consideration

A quick correction, the 1st Chapter's author note SHOULD have said "the current time line is three years after the Noah's Book incident in the manga or the Arachane Battle in the** Anime**."

Also, turns out I've been spelling "meister" wrong for five whole chapters.

The funny thing is I was so sure there was an e in there but spell check and the dictionary agreed with mini-Wikipedia….F U wiki…FU….

*.*.*

"Come here."

It was a command Soul cautiously obeyed, kneeling first at the edge of her bed while Maka searched blindly for some grip of him. The catch of his sleeve, the little tug downward was permission to join her, and though Soul was still mildly concerned with what she hid beneath her arm—tears, blush, a smile, maybe all three—he was smugly anxious to oblige.

Why was her bed more comfortable than his? Was it one of those female secrets they kept to themselves, locked away with the emergency chocolate and see-through sleepwear, or was it just that she was right there, blurring his senses and judgment?

Either way it wasn't fatigue Soul felt as he sunk into the soft mattress, pulled the light blue sheets around them and tried his hardest not to acknowledge anything that would give him a hard on. The last thing he needed was for Maka to consider him a pervert.

Just as he settled on the corner of her pillow Maka's hands were on his shoulders, turning him away, and for the few seconds it took her to slide her arm under his and take good hold of her weapon from behind Soul wondered if she'd changed her mind.

The reward of her pressed against his back was worth hours of doubt.

At least his worries in low places had become more or less irrelevant. 'As long as I wake up before she does…'

Hardly a chance of that happening, but a guy could dream.

Soul thought it might be difficult to sleep with her body molding just so and her breath against his ear and in his hair but just as the soft bed pulled him down so did she—down into the most luxurious sort of drowsiness.

Halfway between a wonderful illusion of playing piano for a smoky jazz club with a slinky black dress singing on the piano top and reality Soul was sure he heard her breathe some thanks at him and just managed to grab firm the hand at his collarbone before plunging.

Over the course of that week it became the accepted norm that whoever went to bed first would be joined by the other eventually. Sometimes Maka found find him writing a new song or Soul would tear her away from her homework, other nights they waited for the sound of the bed creaking as a dark figure climbed under the covers, finally putting aside work for much needed rest and recoup.

It wasn't, by the definition, romantic. It was simply 'them.' Though there was always touching. Shoulders side by side, Maka's hand over Soul's heart, or his arm draped expertly over her abdomen where he could hold her with that gentle possessiveness that came so naturally.

All of it came so damn naturally.

Even as she squirmed in her seat to curl up with a bowl of chocolate popcorn and pour over the luxurious details with Tsubaki, Liz, and Chrona Maka finally admitted that there wasn't anything to tell.

Nothing had changed between them except sleeping patterns.

But, as it was Friday night, and the following morning could be spent lounging around in bed Maka was determined to create that change for herself.

After a long inner debate she realized what was wrong with their little game and why it would never end.

Though she was brave, strong, and considered herself a great deal more capable than the damsels in distress of fairy tales and romance novels she'd still been waiting for Soul to take the first step. While Soul, being the devoted weapon and usually regarding her with that sometimes melting sometimes irksome servile attitude, would never take that step if he wasn't absolutely sure it was what she wanted.

Rubbing her temples over what she hoped would be the last round of calculations for the RIM—Resonance Impact Meter—Maka wondered why he had to be so difficult.

He was waiting for some kind of order, but she would be damned if she ever gave it. Knowing Soul he would say yes and put up with what she wanted even if his feelings were nothing more than slight interest, his desires a quiet flame.

No, she could never give that order, but she _would _give invitation.

The familiar tune from last Tuesday, so close to being complete, drifted through the walls of their apartment like an invitation of its own.

Bravery was her special skill, and she would use that tonight.

Maka entered quietly, not breaking the trance her partner lost himself in when he worked to put the last details on a song.

Three times he stopped to brush the bangs from his eyes, and knowing what he'd do next Maka kept one step ahead of him.

The black hair-tie was in her hands long before his went blindly fumbling for it, and in the pause of groggy recognition she had it snuggly in his white locks.

Soul swiveled in his chair to meet her eyes, smirked at her in thanks and asked the usual: "Like it?"

Bravery.

She took a step forward, standing between his legs and posed so he could reach out and touch any part of her he liked, kiss any part of her he liked.

But Maka wasn't the only one who'd been thinking.

While Soul's first reaction should have been thoughts too graphic for her simple offering his brain was filled with worries about the night he tried Resonance with her and failed. He'd given too much, fueling her energy the next day at the cost of his own, and how it was too convenient that since then she'd become more willing to hold, touch and be touched. Sleeping side by side, waking together, they were all his dreams. And it was his growing, gut wrenching worry that he'd given those dreams to her, forced them on her, and when she acted now she did so because of the suggestion she didn't even know she'd received.

"Maka…" The look on his face wasn't playing her favor.

"I have to tell you…" Guilt? Why would he feel guilty now?

He would have stumbled horribly if he hadn't told himself this story again and again in the dead of night.

Rather than blush and fumble he sat ridged, eyed her with a determined fierceness that prepare for the worst.

"How long have you wanted to do this?"

"…eh?" This was the last thing she'd prepared herself for.

Sheepishly she changed her angle so it would be easier to bolt through the door. "…why?"

She _would_ make him explain. "The other night, I tried to Resonate with you….I gave you too much. Too much of my energy, and…probably too much of myself."

Maka blinked. Her brain stood at total ends, one side wanted to pick apart what he'd just confessed and turn it into a new theory, the other wanted to smother him right there in his seat till neither of them could breath or move.

She smiled at him, a sly, sexy smile that made his toes curl even before she'd lowered her lips to his cheek.

"Eventually I want you to explain that in more detail. But for right now forget about it." Just as smoothly as she'd glided down she rose again, hovering with the slightest tilt of encouragement. "Completely."

"Completely.' He repeated, trying to grasp what she meant and what was left of his nerves.

Forget about it, his worries…if not for those worries he would have stolen her from where she stood and spun with her in a flurry of lips, teeth, and hands on the swiveling chair.

She knew that, for god sake she had to know that…

Hands nearly the length of her whole waist grabbed her hips and gave a demanding tug, and as the heat and butterflies shot through her Maka could only think about how much tighter he could, had, hold her.

Light fingers came skittering up his neck, danced at the exposed collarbone and found the tiny ponytail collected at the strong shoulders that quivered just slightly as he pulled her down.

There was no returning. They would either have each other or nothing else.

It was what she wanted, and came as easily as breathing.

Two pairs of eyes closed, bodies braced, and finally lips touched. Their blind aim was off, someone's nose got in the way, but the third try was nearly perfect, and from that point instinct drove the two needy friends.

Kissing her was like dying, loosing all he'd ever known, then getting a world twice its size thrown violently into the void.

It was a dangerous temptation to let his hands wander, so he squeezed her hips to keep them there—absolutely delighted at the moan from her throat—and changed the angle in that moment her mouth was defenseless.

The black tie stayed in place, she would watch it bounce behind his head later in that way that nearly drove her mad, but Maka dug her fingers through his scalp to play a little longer in safe ground.

Not to touch him in all those curious male places, the strong of his back or the lean curve of his arms was a tedious torture but she wanted to savor the electrical storm ragging through her system—delay its death as long as possible.

Rather than break away they somehow adapted the ability to breath just fine through the nose, only realizing that this wasn't as effective as you'd think until the pain of lungs running on empty was greater than the pain of distance.

Shaken and ridiculously happy, it took Soul a full thirty seconds to realize that Maka's position on his lap wouldn't do if she went completely limp, and would have been just a bit too awkward even without the little mood-kill beneath the legs she balanced on now.

Lifting her with a lazy smile he fell back on the dark sheets, just a little amused as she twisted expertly to roll into his side.

"Still worried?"

"Wouldn't say so, no." He kissed the top of her head before flinging his alarm clock at the light switch—aim impeccable with practice—and the room glowed instead with the white of early night.

Her laughter was his reward, though he could guess that some compulsion in her was itching to know how he expected his alarm to work after that.

*.*.*.*

It was late afternoon noises and hot sunshine that finally compelled her pull away from her dreams long enough to grasp reality.

Maka would have killed for a glass of water, feeling all too sweaty and dry from the thick blankets and willingly baking in the sunlight of the west-facing window brought.

Careful not to wake her partner, new lover, she reminisced proudly at the tingling still in her lips, Maka pulled the first layer away from him before slipping off the bed to round up a glass of water and some portable food. The hunger hadn't hit her till she'd begun to move but now it bordered on nausea.

A pitcher of ice water, two bagels, a knife and jar of peanut butter balanced delicately on the make-shift tray in her arms as she snuck back into bed after spending a reasonable amount of time combing her hair, filling her stomach, and brushing away the taste of morning.

She thought long and hard about a nice cold shower but the irregular rhythm would probably wake Soul and she wanted to be at his side when he decided to leave the jazz room and dancing girls behind.

Feeling refreshed, ready to start her day—and waste it all in his bed, Maka settled back down among the sheets and settled her head on the salty skin of his chest.

The white button uniform shirt suited him so nicely, much better than that sweat-shirt he'd worn for the greater part of their elementary days—till it got sliced neatly in battle—but was so easily unbuttoned it was a wonder she didn't spend most of her class time loosening it one at a time till his torso sat pretty and exposed.

Fingers traveled over the hills of his sides, the abs that were a wonderful little set of two—nothing too flashy but still impressive—and more delicately, revered rather than admired, the line of his scar.

Over time others had come to join it, though none so dramatic as the time she'd nearly lost him to Chrona's long gone insanity.

She had a few of her own, mostly on her arms and legs and nothing threatening to her life.

With a long exhale she wondered what battling would be like with him now, how much would they each fumble to protect the other now that they meant not only mental but physical sanity to one another.

If he died now…

It was the little tear she wasn't expecting that roused Soul, brought a warm, sleepy smirk to his face before lifting a finger to dry her cheek.

"Didn't realize you'd miss me that much."

Maka laughed, throwing aside those thoughts like a poisonous herb from the kitchen. "Don't let it go to your head, people tear up in the morning."

"Sure." He didn't sound convinced but afforded her no chance to retaliate as he caught her mouth in his, smothering not just her response but any following thoughts.

That morning was spent lazily in bed as planed, silently tending to the other's unvoiced wants of 'pass the peanut butter,' 'do you see my button?' and 'come here and kiss me.'

*.*.*.*

The song in her voice was like a meter of its own, Tsubaki thought. Some days she came in practically singing and others it was just a light hum that didn't get past her lips.

As the RIM verged on completion Maka asked Black Star and his partner to help her test it. Kim and Jacqueline, as well as Chrona and Ragnarok were part of her plans for testing too—for a nice wide variety of wavelengths—but at the moment Tsubaki and Meister made the most sense.

With the pair's boundless energy they could continue for hours with hardly any fluctuation, and because if you put a challenge he deemed worthy in front of him Black Star would keep at it as long as his power allowed—and sometimes a little further.

So, with one of Shibusen's latest training assistants—Blair none the less—at one end of the field toying with her blue haired friend Maka sat behind a desk with her customized equipment watching the read outs.

"AAAAH stupid cat! Die for your God!"

"Nyaa." Her voice was musically delighted, and by the sound of it they were both—well, at least Blair was—have great fun.

"OH GOD GET THOSE OUT OF MY FACE!"

Maka chuckled along with Blair's evil giggles; she didn't have to take her eyes off the equipment to know what was going on.

"G-get your breast off my Meister!" Tsubaki's weak but determined cry made her feel an ounce of pity under amusement, but sometimes sacrifices had to be made in the name of science.

So absorbed in her work Maka hardly noticed the nuzzling in the crook of her neck till the sharp teeth nearly pierced her skin.

"Ouch! Hey now—" Tilting her head over the chair she saw the cool ego of her partner through his upside-down smirk.

"You coming home for dinner?"

"Hm…" Her eyebrows twisted in thought, weighing the pros and cons of nutrition over this valuable—and hilarious—data. "Probably."

"If you don't I'll tire him out myself." The kiss he gave was light and refreshing but sent a train of insidious thoughts strait through all the science and figures.

'Mary Jane had the right idea…'

Still folded over her chair Maka reached up as he pulled away to leave, brought him down for one last taste of the unusual lip lock.

"Wooo, Spider man, doin' the best spider caaan!" Black Star's chants and woops of approval broke out over the sounds of the equipment going wild—no longer picking up his readings as his battle and resonance was all but a whisper compared to what she and Soul had cooking at the moment.

Just a little embarrassed, Maka broke away, thanked Soul hurriedly and pretended to go back to work, absently dragging a hand over the little smudge of wetness on the side of her mouth.

It took a good, hard Maka Chop and an exploding pumpkin bomb to get him back on track, but Black Star was finally swimming in the rhythm and giving her conclusive data like he'd never stopped to torment her in the first place.

Another hand at her shoulder brought her to the verge of irritation but when Maka turned and saw the seriousness in Kid's eyes she couldn't chastise him.

"Hey, what's the matter?"

"This machine of yours, I'd like you to test it on me and get some data."

"Sure…I'll be done with monkey boy over there as soon as he drains dry, but I think Blair might be a little tired to—"

"I've got an obstacle in mind."

"Obstacle?"

The morose boy stood absolutely ridged, simply nodded and stuck a thumb towards the back of the practice hall.

"The store room?"

"I've…modified it a bit."

"Oh…ok. I guess you're buying me dinner then." Her humor did little for him so Maka gave his striped suit a friendly pat.

*.*.*.*

Weeks later after the rumors had time to stew and circulate Maka found herself cornered in the least of threatening ways by the girls of Soul's anonymous fan club. For a moment she chuckled to herself over the idea of thanking them for setting the wheels in motion.

"Maka Albarn, what did you do to Soul-sama?" Amy, the ringleader, with her meticulously straitened hair and prim voice looked down her nose at the slightly younger girl.

"Eh? Be a little more specific will you?" None of their worthlessness mattered enough to rile her now; it was all just some sad joke.

"You know what we mean! You've got him wrapped around your finger…"

"You're friends with one of those Chupacabra sluts, maybe she gave you a love potion!"

"She's our cat, actually."

Maka's smile and good humor only raised tempers.

"Go ahead and play your stupid games, but once Soul-sama gets tired to those mosquito bits he'll realize just how much he wants a good handful!"

An abrupt and loud bang of metal behind the pack of girls had all their done-up heads turning to see non other than the young Death Scythe himself, his indoor shoes hooked lazily in his fingers and his socked heel still balanced on the cubby he'd attacked.

"Love potions? Wouldn't figure you girls for believing in that kinda nonsense."

Their moods changed so dramatically it was almost pathetic.

"We were just explaining that it would be unfair if she'd been using her Meister's authority for bad things." The smaller one piped up.

"Oh? Interesting but…really…" he came closer, parting the wall of women effortless to settled a hand on Maka's shoulder. "…Who would choose a Meister who'd already abandoned a weapon once?" Soul's red eyes mocked them as he said this, but when Maka took his hand and turned to lead him away they became as deadly as any glare from Death himself.

Maka's good mood continued for three days after that incident before he finally did something that warranted a Maka chop.

Two years today they'd settled the matter of his abusive admirers, laid down the tracks that seemed to be carved by fate and continued down that road to present day.

As Soul stood on the well worn steps of his apartment, tired eyes on the horizon where Kid's halfway complete hospital stood, contemplating what their last battled meant and where her new determination would lead them he began to wonder if this addiction they had was too potent for their own good.

*.*.*.*

More later! Thanks so much for your reviews. Also check Paintbrushplushi on youtube to see my new Soul Eater AMV (Maka/soul of course. I'm so damn addicted myself)


	6. Schedules to keep

Thanks to my few reviewers a handful of mistakes have been corrected. My gratitude to all of you (and not just my wonderful spell-checkers but everybody who pips up a review)! It helps make a better story and it keeps me going back to change/fix/improve.

If you see something wrong or something that's bothering you feel free to tell me, I always enjoy input and if it makes the tale more enjoyable for you then all the better.

Also, because of the contents of this and the follow chapters rating switched to 'M.' Don't worry, you won't have to keep bouncing back between here and livejournal but it's time for a little spice wouldn't you say?

Lots of love!

*.*.*

A tall, white haired young man with weary red eyes stood on his doorstep, a cup of strong coffee in his hands and heavy thoughts in his head.

Two years, which seemed to be just a moment, yet somehow as long and glorious as a decade, had all but slipped through his fingers just the night before.

They'd struggled so long and hard to bring down Kishin, fighting the madness within their own ranks and around the world, following the whispering leads they were lucky enough to catch by the hair of the tail, and it finally brought them to a confrontation.

The battle was fierce, almost hopeless, but his Meister, friends, and co-workers had no intention of trying to destroy the creature of insanity on their own. It wasn't for nothing they'd spent so many years searching.

Weakened by Maka and Stein's Demon Hunter, Kid's massive Death Cannons, Black Star's insatiable onslaught of attack and the strikes of many others Kishin was forced into a barrier not unlike what Shinigami first trapped him in.

The difference now was that with his skin and body still intact, defenses only lowered, at any moment he could break free.

Stein put that moment on three months from now.

In that time they would bring him all the way from the Himalayans where they'd found him to Death City so Death could destroy him, carefully re-enforcing the magic trap that Kim and the witches on the side of good were kind enough to weave for them.

Death Scythes and a handful of top students were always at hand, but the rotation would happen soon, and Soul knew he would be sent next.

Sent away from Maka, who's work with Resonance here with the children was so important Shinigami-sama wouldn't hear of her going anywhere else. Even to wield her own weapon.

With the nearly perfecting RIM she'd been able to help at least a dozen students raise their fighting power enormously. That little inkling she'd had two years ago evolved into a career, and allowed her to keep looking forward to school even now that they'd graduated from Shibusen Academy.

The plain fact of it was that they were so close to finishing off Kishin once and for all, and having more people with strong power around would be not only practical but necessary.

'I get that, damn it…' He heaved a sigh out his nose, stared blankly into the coffee kept hot in the blaze of a desert afternoon. 'I get it…'

Off in the horizon Kid's hospital was near completion.

And not a moment too soon.

The few floors already well equip for patients were stocked to the brim with injured fighters and those kept for observation. Thinking of Maka and how he was sure he'd lost her Soul became fiercely thankful that the casualty rate still held strong at zero.

That was another matter entirely.

Maka…

He'd failed her in the worst possible way, left her defenseless against their greatest enemy to be killed or worse, as Kishin was known to toy with people in the cruelest ways.

Knowing that he'd fallen in a crucial moment was devastating, but more than even a guilty conscience was the itching worry over what he'd seen through those moments of struggling consciousness.

Maybe it was just an illusion, maybe a dream, but he was so sure that it still left a chill in his bones.

From his Meister's body, twenty, maybe more, scythes shot up, fighting on their own as Ragnarok could from Chrona's back.

What was she, really?

Had she always been this way, or was it some new side effect of insanity and her never ending will to live?

A shiver ran up his spine as he thought of all those nights he'd held her with her back pressed into his chest.

This turmoil and cowardice was killing him, but it was a thought he couldn't shake.

He'd need to talk to her eventually, confront her about how much control she had over her inner weapon, if she had any at all.

The last thing he wanted was to send her off into a tizzy when they had so few days left together but Soul wasn't sure he could sleep in peace without first kicking his doubts to the curb.

*.*.

"HAAAA!" A young girl with hair as black as midnight and eyes the color of fresh soil came charging at Maka, all her concentration focused on trying to match the new graduate's power level. "Witch Hunter!" She and partner tried very hard to create the ultimate weapon form, and were able to sink it halfway before something tripped them up and the mass of coffin shaped energy sputter away like a hastily blown out candle.

"Aw….Lolisticks!" Alex stomped her heavy boots into ground to vent frustrating defeat.

Her weapon, a lanky girl, halfway hidden behind her icy blue hair and the thick collar of her shirt came out of transformation to comfort her.

"We'll get it…"

"She's right. You're very close. Just keep working on making a steady flow of power." Maka flashed them one of her encouraging smiles, on the inside deeply touched by this particular pair who reminded her so much of her own self and dear friend Chrona.

The purpled haired woman in question was still out there, somewhere between the Himalayas and Nevada, guarding the Kishin as the team figured out how to move him.

But this wasn't the time to reminisce.

"Alright! That's all our time for today, those of you who didn't go will perform on Monday, those who did take your readings and study them with your partner! Remember, the key to a good Resonance is a good relationship and finding your mutual awareness."

"Okay…" None of the voices sounded too happy.

God she loved her job.

Not that making children unhappy was something that entertained her, Maka just got a thrill from giving homework. School was one of her passions after all, and she couldn't imagine doing anything else that would allow her so much free time and flexibility—or the privilege of working so close to her partner.

Maka was very proud of the example she set for her students, as Soul often stopped by during training and they would display a significant shift in power with something as simple as a kiss or platonic touching of fists.

Plus she knew he enjoyed the fanfare of "Look! It's a Death Scythe!" and the bright-eyed-bushy-tailed ogling's of the hopeful students.

Personally she was more interested in the whispered dreams of her young girls or hushed promises of the boys that "someday we'll be like that, Death Scythe and Shinigami's right hand human."

With an innately female sigh Maka indulged herself in thoughts of how lucky her life was, how marvelous that her partner turned out to be more than her soul match but also her soul mate.

There was hardly any other way to look at it, and though the last couple of, for lack of better word, dreamy years hadn't put a damper on her sense of reality it had strongly improved her opinions on love.

She'd given him her heart, her life, was willing to give the rest of her days all to him, and after a long, calculated debate with logic and hormones decided she would give him her body.

The thought of it didn't bring a little hurricane of panic as it had months ago, didn't make her worry over all the trouble it would be to get birth control, plan the perfect event, and seduce him. None of it set her out of the comfort zone Maka was delicately aware of. Rather, it gave her a warm hum in her heart and a slight stirring in her belly.

Yes, she was just as sure of this decision as she'd been of choosing him to be her weapon. And wasn't she a grown woman by thunder? Her farther was younger by a year when he had a baby for goodness sake.

She wanted this, and she deserved this.

The only factor working against her now was time. Her first instinct had been to get on with it the very night she'd decided, but he was away at the time on Death's business.

When he came back she'd just started taking the pills and was worried they wouldn't work so soon. After that it was all a mess of Kishin madness; training, juggling schedules, squeezing time in for sleep let alone sex. But now, with their anniversary encroaching and Soul's time in the rotation nearing she knew it was now or never. After all, and shuddering at the thought, Maka realized it was a possibility that he wouldn't be coming back.

The last night they spent together on the plane the wiry woman was nearly brought to tears thinking that if they died in this battle they would die never knowing was it was like to love the other completely unhindered, unrestricted, and without boundaries.

Since that night when she'd exploded irrationally all over Blair's closet she and Soul spent hardly a dream in another bed but the makeshift queen made from their two singles, and rarely without their other half.

Passion was never an issue, there was always plenty of it, but both knew—before this both knew that at some point they had to stop, draw away, and willfully fall asleep.

Soul was very careful not to let any disappointment show in his eyes or in the language of his body as he lay next to her, and she was deeply aware of it. Not that it ever made her feel guilty. Her body was her own, hers to do with what she will, and not even her soul mate could seduce her without permission.

The armload of groceries swayed with each step, knocking the butter into her leg in a way that was just annoying enough to warrant her attention. Melt proof case or not she had more important things to think about than how to shift the butter away from the bruise on her thigh.

She should cook something for dinner, something delicious, sensual, maybe something they could eat in bed. Or…was that what dessert was for?

Christ would she have to bake? Did they have any chocolate?

With all this mulling in her brain, coming very close to a decision, there was a distinct, heavy feeling of disappointment when Maka smelled the chicken already roasting as she stepped into her home.

Dessert it was then.

Soul stood in the kitchen as she expected, his back to her and his attention on the unseen ingredient sentenced to death on the cutting board.

She set the bags down easy, quietly, before taking him from behind.

Pressed against her weapon this way the whole of the world's troubles seemed like dust on the doorstep. "Smells pretty good." The half complement should have him scoff and retaliate with a remark about _her _culinary attempts.

Instead he was silent.

Maka leaned over his arm, cheek rubbed into the material of his shirt. "Are you cutting with your blade?"

She watched, more than a little impressed as he managed to slice meticulously through the vegetable without more than nicking the surface of their wooden cutting board. And Maka knew his scythe could easily slice the whole counter in two.

A brooding pout settled on her lips when his attention still wasn't hers.

Flexible as she was it was easy to slip under his human arm and draw his face in her hands, brushing the skin with a light thumb before tilting him to meet her annoyed eyes.

Soul only watched her a moment, something oddly cold and conflicted in his eyes, before pivoting so she could stand where he had. "Wanna try?"

She laughed, having done the job numerous times before but decided to humor him. "Sure." Before she could stretch to reach the knife rack he stopped her, a finger pointed into her chest as if in accusation. "Like I did."

"…."

Why wasn't her brain working? Why did he look so god damn condemning?

Maka started to draw away, more hurt by all he was withholding, all she could read loudly in his body and soul than the few words designed to provoke.

Never before had she felt so uneasy and misplaced with her partner so near, not since that one time in London when they pushed the boundaries of their wavelengths and lost hold of each other. But even then…even then she still trusted him.

She wasn't sure she trusted the man standing in her kitchen, looking down at her with as much turmoil and unease as that which stormed inside her.

She didn't feel inclined to answer, but turned and walked away feeling as empty as the gutted chicken in the stove.

If nothing else, Soul knew now that she was aware, but not in control.

But maybe the price had been too high.

*.*

He found her later in their bed, staring at her right hand though there was a book in her left.

Armed with chicken and the chocolate cake she'd considered making Soul entered carefully. A book in her hand was as good as any weapon in the blood.

Remembering the look on the face in the kitchen gave the white haired man plenty of food for thought. The result; guilt was beginning to gain on worry.

And the blank look of mourning in her green eyes was the final blow.

He took a seat beside her, stole the hand she scrutinized and kissed it.

In the change of her expression there were thousands of questions but "why?" was the only one voiced.

"Well, you kinda tipped my world over." Soul tried desperately to lighten the mood with one of the smirks that usually melted her, but she stayed firm.

"I didn't exclude you so you could find out like this."

"No, I didn't think so."

"The honest to god truth is I just damn well forgot ok? I was ten the last time anyone bothered to tell _me_ about it and Shinigami-sama said it was dormant!"

Defense rose around her like an angry swell in the ocean.

"Well Kishin seems to have woken it up."

"Kishin makes Stein a useless laughing puddle!" She snapped. "He does a lot of things to a lot of people…"

She flexed the hand free of his, scrunched her face in concentration, but nothing changed.

"…It's not going to happen again, so you can stop looking at me like I've been risking your life all these years…"

How was she able to pick right into the sore places?

"It's just…suddenly all I could think was what if one night you'd and a nightmare, or some noise set you off. I'd be chopped liver."

She laughed, but not the reassuring way. "Isn't it the same for me? Apply that same logic to your own damn self."

The weight in his stomach tripled, then something very close to anger filled his throat. "At least I can control mine!" Did she have any idea how long he tormented himself about that after the first night he'd woken up panicked in bed with her?

"I don't have anything to control! It's not there; it's not an issue! You know what dormant means."

"Didn't look so dormant the other night."

Angry tears were in her eyes before she could beat them back. What was he doing? Why now? Where was the comfort, the relaxation, he always brought her? How could she possibly sleep with him now…

There was that look of grief again, grief because apology and regret didn't seem to describe what he felt from her. Any longer like this and she might loose herself in it, and because that wasn't on his agenda Soul grabbed her in his hands, thumbs skirting the corner of her eyes, ready to catch the tears brimming there and kissed her hard.

He didn't feel her, beyond the tingling of lips there was no trace of Maka, and that scared him almost as much as what they'd been arguing over.

"I didn't do this to hurt you…" Proud tears spilled on a blank face as he gave up and pulled away.

"Those should be my words." A light caress with his thumb, the kind that always calmed her, warranted no response.

"No…no, you did this with hurt in mind." Damn it, now they really were running.

"I was afraid, angry—frustrated. Do you know what it was like watching you take on Kishin without me? _Hold him off_ without me?" He stroked her face, trying to get the warmth back in it. "You've always been strong…but the one thing you needed was me. If you were your own weapon…" His pleading voice trailed away as she began to comprehend just a little, return to him just a little.

"I'd always need you." Foreheads touched as she leaned in, the limp hands at her lap twitched to life as she thought of grabbing his shirt.

"I'll always need you." Her words were just a breath on his face but relief kicked in his heart nonetheless.

The urge to pull him down with her was too great to ignore, but she did it gently, nudging with the cheek that touched his. Strong arms wrapped around her, a white head buried in her shoulder and they sank into the pillows.

*.*.*

Stein added the final adjustments to the platform; per his usual style it was all a mess of patchwork and stitches but a strong metal that would hold the weight of their enemy and his escort team.

Kid lay on his back underneath the structure, perfectly mobile thanks to Beelzebub, attaching the Death Busters. "These should hold till we cross the North Atlantic. We might stop in California to switch them out, just for safety's sake." His eyebrows squirmed in pondering. "Maybe even Japan.

"That's coming along nicely." Marie brought a warm smile and hot food with her, both heavily appreciated by the makeshift team of engineers.

BJ flipped his mask up, stopped sauntering the safety rails to flash his own lazy smile, very willing to take a break from working in the bitter cold.

"With the good spirits you're giving us one'd hardly think we were keeping the world's greatest evil at bay."

"I'm not sure I'd call him the greatest evil…" The blond woman pondered into the cup she held for Kid. "…more like the greatest insanity."

"He's a menace to the world and its order, chaos incarnate, and we own him no softness nor dignity."

Came the harsh retaliation from the young Shinigami.

"Yes, you're right…" Of course, Marie had as much ambition as anybody, and knew well enough that even though she was a Death Scythe her greatest strength lay in her ability to calm, sooth, and heal what was inside a person.

Like Maka and her Witch Hunter disciples Marie had her own set of protégée, two here with her now, and more than physical attack each night they projected into Kishin the feelings of calm, trust, and thoughts of staying right where he was.

Over the years while madness spread like oil over the ocean her wavelength became very important, not just for Stein but for anyone suffering greatly from Kishin's absent influence. The usefulness evolved into a group of five girls with similar abilities, and together they packed quite the emotional punch.

Betty was her youngest, but all the more effective for her innocence and laughter, and it was she who cooked the meal in Marie's hands.

The happy hum from Stein was testament not only to the food but to the love hidden between potatoes and meat.

Chrona, her oldest, dearest, student was in the tents, resting with Liz and Patty while the last three members of their party stood watch over the caged demon. After conquering her own insanities, insecurities, and issues nobody was terribly surprised by her newfound ability.

"How long till we take off?"

"Another hour before you should start rousing everyone." Kid confirmed, finally wheeling out to stand and accept the soup the woman he once called teacher waited patiently to give to him.

Sipping the hot nourishment he eyed their snowy surroundings suspiciously. Sid and Nygus were out there somewhere, unseen, but setting traps and waiting for an ambush they all prayed wouldn't come.

It was a precaution, he told himself, nothing but a smart precaution.

Aside from where they worked everything was deep in white and cold as death.

"The boosters are finished, I'll call Father and make sure the helicopter will be there to rendezvous with us over Nepal."

The journey wouldn't be a simple one. This platform was mean to carry Kishin all the way to Nevada, though boat or plane might have been simpler, faster, this was the only stable way. Planes and boats had turbulence, and changing location would just put strain on the barrier.

That was another thing they had to do before leaving.

He sighed, rubbed his temples as he shifted through his pockets for a mirror. He wouldn't waste the energy to call his father directly.

Very soon they would need Meisters and Weapons who could fly.

Maka and Soul were on that list but he wondered how much time, if any, Shinigami would allow Maka to leave the school. They did need more Witch Hunters, yes, but the matter of security at hand was more pressing than that of three weeks from now.

Still, he wondered briefly how they were recovering, wishing them the best.

*.*.*.*

It would take more than a hug and a few strokes to sooth her bruises, but as they held each other, watched the light change from sunset orange to the deep violet of dusk, neither said a word and were better for it. Small hands traced the roughened lines of his musician's fingers, slid up his arms as he spread a hand over the low of her back and into her hair.

Worn, soothed, and feeling that old hum of comfort once again the pair slipped into sleep like cats in the sunlight.

*.*

When Maka woke she felt her head much clearer, lay very still in his hold as she probed and mulled over his side of their little episode. Fear was probably the main factor, and Soul never did well with fear. She remembered the pride in his eyes, apology in his touch, and most of all the loving aura of his spirit.

His worries weren't unreasonable, it was the way he'd gone about expressing them. Even if it was the only way he knew how.

Still—her fingers played in his bangs, brushing away the light hair she could barely see in the darkness of night that surrounded them now—this was the man she'd chosen.

This was the man she loved.

Kissing him was like a surge of power; something more feline than Resonance and completely one sided though it was just a gentle touching of lips.

This was the man she wanted to spend the rest of her life fighting with, beating back the forces of evil and building a home with.

Softly she kissed him, slowly pouring more of herself and the heat in her belly into it to rouse him from his dreams.

This was the man to whom she would give all, and take everything in return.

Sliding away from his grasp to hover over him on her elbows, his arm still limp with sleep over her back, Maka turned the kiss on high. Smirked when she felt him stir beneath her hands, his mouth moved in reflex against hers, the sharp teeth behind his lips nipping at the sides of hers.

While he woke she ran her hands over him, down his arms to the place just below his navel that made him gasp beneath her kiss and go ridged.

"Love me?"

His heart beat wildly against her chest, hands fumbled to readjust as the woman laying over him angled her question and kisses into his neck.

"I love you." Soul caught her face, kissed her hard and long until she was the one melted and unsteady.

Her fingers were butterflies on his shoulders, vices in his hair, and a constant torment to the growing fire he had to ignore.

One by one his buttons came undone, followed smartly by a kiss upon the newly exposed flesh. Something caught in his throat as she shifted ever so smoothly into his lap, sitting strait and beckoned him to follow.

As they'd done so many times in the past they hunted the other's needs and wants, obliging or withholding to slowly torment as they saw fit.

A slight shake of his shoulder, the help of her hand and the shirt was gone, her own not far behind.

He sat as strait as she, loosed her shirt, laughed with her as it came over her head and messed her hair, and with his mouth nibbling at her chest unhooked the clamps to the sleek black bra.

Her partner's arms folded her tight against him, becoming the decency she often sought as they lay half naked in the starlight even though it was only his eyes looking at her. Even though he'd seen her so many times before, held, tormented and adored what he now humored her in hiding from the world.

Here she paused a moment, enjoying the simple pleasure of flesh on flesh. Part of her always wondered why it was so important, so deep and relaxing that there was nothing else like it. A psychologist would say it had something to do with her father, or mother, and the love she wished she'd received but didn't.

Breathing deep in his scent Maka pushed those thoughts away, now wasn't the time for thinking.

Comfortable in his lap she kissed him again, no longer keeping count, and with him distracted shifted to settle over the hardness in his jeans.

Hoping he got the message she grabbed his shoulders and pulled him down again, angling him to kneel over her with minimal convincing necessary.

She felt it against her shorts, knew that if she wasn't wearing any he could easily take her.

There was no panic, and Maka smiled as she kissed and nibbled under his questioning gaze.

She wanted to take and be taken, share all she had an all she would be.

Soul saw this, but was no less surprised when she went for his zipper. For a brief moment he was perfectly still as she lit select pieces of him on fire with tooth and tongue, unsure of what to do or think. It was a possibility that this was all some great apology, but he saw no apology in her eyes or in that sexy new smirk that flowed with confidence and feline prowess. No, Maka would have made this decision after long consideration.

The rawness on his ear lobe made his breath hitch and had him thanking the gods.

If she wanted it this way—his smile matched hers as he pried her hands away from their games to kiss each in turn, then twist his fingers in her shorts to give a swift and effective tug—so be it.

*.*.*

ahem. Bwahahaha more on its way


	7. Three troubles means disaster

I jus read Amplify's new chapter and by god I don't think I could ever write so skillfully but…here it goes…

*.*.*

Maka felt nothing short of victory as his fingers took hold of her shorts, not the slightest bit of embarrassment when he pulled them off, and wonderfully powerful as the muscles in his neck and shoulders rippled with what she could only assume was restraint.

Her hands found him again, dragged over the tension, bone, and strength in his back just for the pleasure of it.

Soul explored as she did, hands running wild over her sides and just under the cusp of her breasts. He almost shuddered from the want, the deep in the bones need to kiss every inch of her—starting with the hint of rib just under those wonderful handfuls of flesh.

Not without a bit of self resentment he held out, wanted to watch her just a moment more, bind the memory of her willingly parted lips, slightly tousled auburn hair, and those white lacy cuts of cloth covering that last little piece of her.

Nails, not sharp but potent trailed down the curve of his spine and he all but snapped in two. With a shudder of breath and body he drew her hips up in one swift jerk, too lost to be pleased that it took her little time to recover and arch her back to meld into his chest.

Those clever, torturous fingers did more of the same, now with greater reach, and he was sure he'd go mad.

To hold off that imminent doom Soul brought his mouth over her breast, clamping just lightly enough with his teeth to set them both through a shivering tizzy.

Apologizing with tongue and the brush of his bottom lip down the under curve towards those rib lines and lean muscle Soul cursed at himself. 'You _will_ have more finesse than the skittery virgin you are damn it!'

His skin was hot under her hands, nothing like the throbbing in her belly or the furnace in his pants but erotic and thrilling nonetheless.

One of his palms skimmed away from her hip to cradle her at the center, adjusting accordingly Maka tilted into him to brush over the bump she knew he would've made a point to hide at any other time.

With nothing but cotton and jeans between them now the sensation seemed more potent than usual, rippling through her with that tight squeeze she sometimes got while watching his back as he trained or played his music.

Riding on that sensation she bit into the shoulder she'd teased earlier, kissing along the jaw light at her disposal and all but moaned into his ear when he gave the same treatment to her torso.

Every place he'd never touched before vibrated in gratitude or a want to be next.

As her hand went lazily to the button still intact at his waistline he stopped it mid-act, driving it over her head to be kept captive there as he dipped her back into the pillows. "Just wait a damn minute…" He mumbled above her lips before crashing into the taste of cherries, mint, and Maka.

The sweetness of his kiss was such a contrast to the possessiveness that held down her right hand, the roughness that followed as his other groped over her body to tease the cotton bikini-cut.

Fingers that held her wrist captive sought out her own, curling into them with a gesture as deeply Soul as the kiss that still left her whole system weak.

Her free hand picked up where the right left off, but found focus and control a little out of reach. How hard could undoing a bit of metal and cloth be? But Christ her hands were shaking, not nervous but numb and desperately anxious. She wanted to feel his skin again, and the ever-tightening pull in her core and the haze in her nerves was making her motor skills pitiful.

"Help." She pleaded through the exhale he allowed with the temporary separation of lips.

Soul obliged with a smirk, not missing a beat as he indulged in sucked at the skin of her collar bone, salty and slick with the first sheen of sweat, his hand elsewhere.

Carefully he judged how much of his weight could be pressed on her while his feet worked to pull the pale blue material over the footboard.

Sure he'd heard a giggle Soul chomped with sharp canines in defiance. She gasped, squirmed, and his manliness was restored.

A sharp kick and twitch of calve and they were even, clad only in the undergarments they would have kept locked out of sight during laundry day.

In reflex and anticipation Maka moved to her own beat against him, sending shudder and ripple of pleasure throughout his nerves till he wasn't sure he could take it anymore.

One long finger hooked through the thigh, easily sliding the material down just far enough for the other four to play without hinder.

Nevada heat was nothing to what he felt just at the opening of her, slid a single finger to test the sensation and wetness.

Like a puppet master Soul discovered where to touch and what response followed, noting how she arched, convulsed, or flinched.

He lifted her hips again; lay the lightest of kisses atop hot lips before slowly, much too slowly working his way to her mouth.

Though her hazy brain certainly wasn't functioned as it usually did Maka saw the rise of his head between her thighs and desperately hoped he wouldn't try and pull her panties away with her teeth as they did in novels—knowing she would burst out laughing despite the growing ache in her.

The hand twined with hers slid off the pillow to rest by her neck, and with the caress of his thumb along her jaw he had her eyes so intently he could see the red of his own shine in her green. The white haired weapon pressed his lips to each eyelid softly, and she left them closed as he moved to kiss her deeply, draw from the storm in them both.

"Love me?" He breathed.

"I love you."

The pull in her was so great now, so terrible she worried it might become a black hole that would swallow them, but at that moment the heat in her met its equal, and a dull throbbing pain, not completely unpleasant took its place.

"Ah!" Her voice cracked against his mouth, and though there was just a small instinct in her to twist and squirm away from that unfamiliar feeling she knew that wouldn't do. Her fingers curled so tightly over his he became instantly afraid that he'd done it all wrong, that she wasn't really ready…

"Kiss me." Her plea came with an eyeful of tears, the only she would allow, and he took her mouth, determined to fix what he'd broken.

Anything, please god, anything to take her mind off it.

His shoulders, his scent, his hair, the feel of his warrior's physic was like a spell, momentarily broken but sealed again so easily it only took a moment.

As bodies adjusted her grip relaxed, but Soul didn't.

He stayed ridged, and because she could see the gears whirling in his brain the smile she flashed him was one of love and want and the pain he wouldn't be fooled by.

She nibbled at his ear to encourage, nosed him, then nibbled again to hide the wince as she moved with him.

What a silly pair they were, but oh how much she loved him.

*.*.*.*

For the first time in his known life Soul Evens woke without the aid of an alarm. _Before _his Meister did.

Watching her spread over the sheets, long, lean limbs grasped the pillow and his arm, the silky grey-brown hair she never wore in those high girlish ponytails anymore tousled and undone, and the smart curve of her lips, still cherry pink and a little raw like the rest of her, made quite the picture.

He brushed her face, glad that the color was back in her cheeks, and after slow, deliberate consideration decided not to rouse her. Delicately he entertained a single hand down her side, smoothed her hair before taking her lightly in his arms and letting out a luxurious sign of content.

Whatever time it was, and he certainly didn't care, the day would just have to wait for them. He closed his eyes, drifted partially to sleep just as Maka woke from her own dreams.

They lazied about for a solid hour, too happy, stiff, and warm to bother with moving. 

"How's it feel?" He asked, eyebrows furrowed as he squeezed her hand in a worried, apologetic gesture.

"Want the truth?" Her green eyes were like pixie magic as she tested and teased him.

"Yes."

Because he looked so serious she offered a sugarless answer.

"Honestly…" She gave her lower half a little squirm, winced at the soreness and the rub of the sheets. "Kinda like I slept with a baseball bat between my legs."

She could have laughed at the sheer width of his eyes, the shook and mild horror, but realized that would have been too cruel, so she purred and stretched instead, determined to show him how much she also felt like she might as well be glowing.

"But wonderful all the same." Maka added through the light kiss that sealed his sanity, partly sweeping away that amusing look.

They were just a few minutes away from realizing how absolutely starving they both were when a very loud, very persistent knocking interrupted their peaceful lay-about.

"Maybe if we ignore it, it'll go away…" She whispered, arms wrapped loosely around his neck in mid-snuggle.

"DON"T IGNORE YOUR GOD!"

"Fucking Ninja hearing..."

It _would_ be Black Star this early in the…she glanced at the clock…afternoon.

"Lovebiiiiiirds, hey! Get off your damn tree and get out here!"

Grumbling, Soul did his gentleman's duty and clambered out of bed before she could, planting a kiss on her temple as he cursed his way out of the sheets. Grouchily he zipped into his jeans, absently plucked up the plate of chicken and cake that went untouched from the night before.

An ill-conceived glance over his shoulder nearly brought a whine from his throat. Whatever Black Star had to say it better be damn well important for him to leave his Meister, naked, glistening in the sunbeams and tangled torturously in the white cloth, behind in bed.

The sun was a torment to his eyes as Soul swung the door open, squinting to see his bright haired friend scowling as loud as a person could while being completely silent.

"Whatdya want…"

"Death man says next crew's going out today. He wants you in the office by two for take off." With his message delivered Black Star's eyes wandered to the chicken and cake.

"Oh hey for me? Thanks!" Without another word he took the now crunchy confection between his fingers and gulped it down.

The look on his face after the taste and texture sunk in was sweat revenge.

"Dude….not cool…"

Trying to save a slice of dignity larger than the cake he'd helped himself to the blue haired ninja chewed the rest of it, swallowed, and tried not to scrunch his nose in disapproval.

"You could at least warn a guy before he eats stale food…"

Soul nodded absently.

Black Star getting what was coming to him was hardly in his top priority of thought at the moment.

In a gesture of peace Soul offered his fist, pleased but hardly unburdened when his best friend answered in kind.

"Be grateful I didn't let you eat the chicken."

With a wave he closed the door again, shut out the sun, heat, and world. There was a sharp ache in him that wanted to keep it all at bay, to stop time because there was so little of it left.

Dumping the chicken and plate to deal with later the agitated Weapon hurried back to his Meister's side.

The irregular pounding of rain—unaccompanied by the smell of it—told him she'd opted for a shower, and the stripped bed told him she'd already stuffed the sheets in the wash.

Determined not to waste a single moment—and he refused to acknowledge the clock—Soul silently opened the bathroom door and invited himself in.

Maka was vaguely sure she heard the creak of the door, a zipper come undone, and a single pair of jeans hit the floor. So when two large hands came around her waist she wasn't the least surprised, and happily tangled them into her own.

"What did he want?" Leaning back into the warm body of her Weapon Maka smiled with something beyond content, let that feeling twist into personal pride after hearing his strangled gulp.

"I'll tell you later."

He brought his head around, hunched to smother her mouth, ignoring the suds in her hair that caught at the corners of his mouth irritatingly.

Just as her toes were curling in the streams of water he reached for the soap, released her mouth to nuzzle at her neck and relinquish in the simplicity of touching her so freely.

Maka knew there was something more in his want, something he'd pushed back inside him, and though she'd thought those days were over she welcomed the opportunity to recover a little longer—the soreness really caught up with her when the rest of her body stopped feeling so numbly asleep—and love him with just the gentle touch of two halves making their whole.

In her most luxurious fantasies this was how they spent their first morning together, and her smile stretched wide to find that reality was so much better than imagination.

Touch, and be touched, gentle, caring, understanding. Even if the sex had been terrible, which it hadn't, this unhindered bond that grew suddenly between them would be well worth it.

*.*

Maka judged him carefully; almost positive the news was bad.

It was the way he scrubbed so viciously with the towel, his body angled away from the door and his eyes dead-set on the soaked blue rug like _it_ was the offending party.

Putting on her best smile Maka hoisted herself onto the counter, grabbed his brush and started with the mess in his hair before exploring the mess in his heart. "What is it?"

Soul tied the towel around his waist, turned to settle between her legs, and even as his red eyes poured all the apology and regret he could muster the words polluted the air. "Next shift leaves today."

Maka just barely kept her mouth from falling, but her eyes betrayed the disappointment, fear, and hurt of a pet who'd been abandoned. "But…they—Today?"

His lips kissed her hair, and when he held her, long and tight, she understood that the idea of leaving was killing him too.

She wanted to stay with him all day, lazying here and there, lingering in the concern he would shower and the love he'd soak her in.

"When?" Maka set her chin on his shoulder, determined not to show him her pain. This was Kishin business, and twice as important as her girlish wants.

"Gotta be up on the hill by two."

She nodded thoughtfully, gave his hair another loving, encouraging pet, though she really wanted to scream, shout, and throw things.

They lingered a heart beat longer on the counter, savoring the flavor of that moment before time came to fight against them

"Well…" She huffed out the word with a thick exhale. "You pack, I'll make lunch. Who knows when you'll get another good meal."

His wince at the thought of all the canned junk and preserved meats brought a genuine laugh from her chest.

The afternoon went by easier than they would've guessed, lighter, though the mood would occasionally snap as they grasped desperately for one another—too annoyed or defiant of that quiet atmosphere.

They arrived at Death's doorstep with twenty minutes to spare, for once not beating Tsubaki and Black Star.

The pair—not nearly as unbalanced as they'd once looked with Black Star's growth spurt—were doing warm ups in the hallway. It never failed to amaze Maka how well her friends could run along the walls without falling or how gracefully Tsubaki fought. How could someone look so vicious and angelic at the same time?

Mystery as it was she called out cheerfully, hardly disrupting their dance as they continued to spar through the exchange of greetings and 'how you doing's."

When Tsubaki's whole attention belonged to her Maka pulled her aside to talk, waving reassurances at the boys that they wouldn't gossip about anything too conniving.

She wanted desperately to lay the details of last night at her friend's feet but business came first. Holding the Amazonian tight at the shoulders Maka pleaded with all seriousness "You'll take care of Soul, won't you? Make sure he chokes down some of those jerky slices…"

Tsubaki smile and raised a fist to show her dedication. "Of course."

Some of the concern tumbled away.

"Good. Now that that's over…" Her feline smile nearly betrayed the secret. "Last night, we did it."

"Oh Maka! How was it? Did he know what to do? Are you ok?"

Girl talk had a way of setting your whole world just a little bit straighter, like chocolate without the guilt, and Maka smirked proudly.

"It's amazing, you feel so free afterwards. Like you could…I don't know, do anything in front of the guy and he wouldn't care cuz he's seen you at your most vulnerable." She laid a hand over her heart. "I love him so much, it feels like…somehow, if he…didn't come back, I might be ok. That I could ride on this high for the rest of my life."

It wouldn't last that long, she knew, but right now she wanted that hope.

Tsubaki grabbed her, gave the strong but small shoulders a quick shake. "Don't worry about that, he's coming home if I have to drag him away from the battle myself."

The smile reached her eyes again. "Thanks Tsubaki."

*.*.

A handful of people were left behind that afternoon, and Maka stood with them all, waving at the jet with its shining black exterior.

She refused to worry about this, loose any sleep, or let it keep her from cheerily going about her work. Soul gave his strongest promise to return, and damn it, he would keep that vow.

*.*.*.*

If there was anything more drone than the flying saucer he'd spend the next week playing prison keeper on, Soul wasn't aware of it.

The gray of the skies was hardly encouraging, though this mission did have a heavy sense of sobriety. He cursed himself for letting his personal agenda seem more important than the _fate of the whole damn world_.

This was ridiculous.

He had to keep Maka out of his head, get the feel of her out of his fingertips and stop the tingling in his lips.

The flight across the North Pacific took almost half a day, and after landing in Japan to switch to a helicopter with questionably skull shaped blades another hour was spent hovering to meet the circular craft.

It didn't look like much, hardly any walk room between the metal dome where Kishin "slept" snuggly. Safety rails with three sets of bars offered a bit of comfort, as they _were_ hovering a good hundred feet above ground, and a single solid strip of metal—probably something Marie insisted on—held secure just behind the tent and crate of supplies.

Kid waved them down, Liz and Patty at his side and the whole six-person crew waiting eagerly to go home stood behind them.

A little light perked his foul mood when he noticed Chrona. He'd forgotten she was on the first shift with Marie and Stein.

The grey haired teacher was giggling nervously to himself as his favored Death Scythe held him like a limp toddler.

"Not a moment too soon!" She called out over the roaring whoosh of the helicopter blades, a warm but tired smile on her eye-patched face.

"Yo." Soul greeted his friends with a raise of the hand, noted their weary, un-groomed appearances and hoped they wouldn't clobber him for smelling faintly of lavender.

"Hi there…" Chrona waved, a little shyly, though her cheerfulness was on par with Patti and Maries'.

"Lay it on me, how bad is the food?"

"Oh…it's no so bad. It's sleeping that's the most inconvenient." She started to squirm unconsciously, something she'd never quite grown out of. "I'd much rather be in a nice corner…Where you can't roll through the bars and fall into the ocean..."

Because she was about to go on twitch overboard Soul patted her shoulder and jerked a thumb at the helicopter. "Well, take a good long break in your own bed. If you're lucky you won't be back out here anytime soon."

She stopped, straitened, then smiled with determined eyes. "But I want to help! I'll start sleeping on the edge of the bed."

With that she climbed aboard the helicopter, stopping to chat a moment with Black Star and Tsubaki as the blue haired ninja offered her a hand up.

When the helicopter broke away he looked around at this "shipmates" and huffed some of the dread from his chest. Kid and partners, Black Star, Tsubaki, Kim, one of Marie's students and her camo-clad Meister.

There wasn't much in the way of work to be done, along with a new crew the helicopter also brought fresh laundry and a cart of supplies, and all this had to be stewed away neatly in the box behind the tent.

When that was finished, however, the nine Shibusen warriors tried not to be die by the hand of boredom.

Tsubaki seemed content to re-arrange and organize what the others had put away, Black Star challenged him to upside-down sit-ups by the thousands, Liz sat with one eye on her magazines, one on her sister, Kid watched the metallic dome with a vengeful twitch, and Kim and the girl Krista made their beds in the tent—her partner alarmingly disappeared for a good half hour before Soul realized he was in her pocket, though he could have sworn he felt a weapon's aura from the militaristic looking man.

He tried no to think of Maka, what they'd shared and done, but hat night as he lay in the cramped tent, shivered himself to sleep, he was finally free to feel her in his dreams.

*.*

Like any day he woke in his own bed, seeing nothing wrong with the golden light that gave everything the slightest blur, only concerned that Maka wasn't beside him.

He went looking for her, down a twisty road of red stone past houses that hummed with piano music.

Eventually he found her on Death Hill, her hair down, blowing gently in the breeze wearing an unusually feminine dress that whipped around her legs.

She looked beautiful, almost glowing, and when she turned to him he saw the swell in her belly, her hands stroke over it lovingly while her eyes held his as if to say "look at this amazing thing we made."

Shocked to his very bones, a proud and wildly terrified smile pulling at the side of his mouth, Soul stumbled towards her.

There was laughter in her eyes as she let one hand reach for him, but in the time of a blink there was blood splattered across her laughter, and Soul could only look on in absolute horror as she was split open from the inside by a silver scythe, watch as the momentum sent her backwards, over the edge to fall slowly as he ran even slower, desperate to catch her, only just making it in time to see that her smile was still there, only now it said "forgive him…I love him so forgive him."

He woke with such a start that the whole tent shook. If the cold hadn't scored his throat he would have screamed her name, rousing the whole crew and loosing an incredible amount of face. Though at this point he didn't really care. His heart, still racing violently from the pain and shock of it all, gave a hard lurch as his brain began the cruel process of trying to understand what it meant. Slow and sick the idea came, like rotten molasses it chocked and poisoned him to the point of physical illness. What if it was a sign? Some fragment of their connection reaching out to him to deliver the message. What if she was pregnant now? Right this minute? Oh god, had they used a condom?

No…Panic clutched in his gut. No they hadn't.

Frantic for a mirror, and source of reflection, Soul tried halfheartedly to convince himself that Maka would have planned, taken pills or preparation, something!

]

*.*.*

Kid hadn't left the craft once, and he knew that it was a tremendous strain on his weapons but as the only mobile shinigami in the world he understood that taking a break would just leave him to worry and fuss and he wouldn't get any rest to speak of.

So he wasn't expecting Liz's voice to sound gentle as she called him into the crew's tent.

"Hey boy wonder, come get some sleep."

The toothpick thin man turned slightly, wary that it might be some sweet honey trap and that Patti was waiting behind the curtains with a water bottle to douse over his head.

"Come on…" There, now she had just a little whine in her rhythm and he could trust that, could believe in her temper and moods. "…you can keep an eye on Kishin through the tent, it's not wavelength-proof you know."

Because he was in the habit of giving his older weapon what she wanted, when it was reasonable and convenient, Kid obliged.

Maybe it was because of Tsubaki's rearranging or Kim's meticulous nature but the tent seemed a little bigger than it had the last few nights.

"There, see? Kid's here too. He didn't fly back to the mansion and get cocoa."

"K…."

Ah, so that's what this was about. The young shinigami couldn't help the minor twang of disappointment on his heartstrings that this had all been some ruse for her sister's peace of—still highly unstable—mind. Or the unexplainable stab that followed when Liz smiled at her sister with such intense love as the younger drifted off in her sleeping bag dotted with mushrooms.

A quick look around confirmed that the sleeping situations were selective. A pathway down the middle served for safety, but other than that everyone on the day rotation was packed in—probably beneficial against the cold of the North Pacific Ocean air.

One hand was at the door when he heard a distinct 'patpat' behind him. Curiosity had him turn, and when he saw Liz clearly offering the deep blue sleeping bag meant for her he raised an eyebrow.

His weapon only shrugged and gave a motion with her finger to show that she insisted.

Cautiously he settled in next to Patti, his head not far from her sister's lap and his nose tickled by the stray ends of her long hair.

Wrapped in a set of blankets he realized were his own she leaned back, secure against the safety rail, and closed her eyes.

Deciding to stay mildly alert incase this turned into a terrible prank Kid did the same, slowly adjusting to the dramatic shift in comfort. He'd been standing still for Father knows how long, most of his attention focused on studying Kishin's energy flux, and repeated the same over most of his days.

The back of someone's hand on his cheek brought him to full alert. "What?"

"You're still chilled." He could almost hear the 'tsk' playing at the ends of her words as Liz tried to scowl his temperature into behaving.

"I'm always chilled."

"But not in the shinigami way, in the 'it's likely I have frost bite' way."

Kid snorted in sheer amusement, metaphorically throwing up his hands and decided that he didn't care what her motives were anymore.

"Is _that _why you persuaded me in here?"

"Partially…" The hand on his cheek glided into his hair, brushing it with the skill of someone quite accustomed to doing so.

He looked up at her, oddly serene, confused, and just a little aching.

He'd never forgotten what she told him, the ultimatum she'd given, and to this day kept his promise and kept it strong.

The thought of loosing the girls terrified him, and judging from the glint in her eyes maybe she held the same sentiment.

Wouldn't it be wonderful if she could just say "I'm never leaving so don't worry?" Even a simple thank you for trying so hard would suffice. Then again, maybe she didn't know how much he pushed himself, how difficult it was to change his very core of being. But how could he show that to her? It was something too personal even for the bond of weapon and master.

But wasn't that just his pride?

*.*.*

Black Star watched Kid follow the beckoning of his weapon and wondered how the guy didn't manage to see how much she loved him. Not that he had much right to talk, he thought with a disgruntled snort, eyes shifted just so to allow a better view of Tsubaki.

Time had only been kind to her, preserving and enhancing her beauty like a fine sake, and though she was beautiful she was equally deadly—with or without him.

Listening to the troubles of his friends the young ninja had plenty to compare their situation to, and worried that what he felt just didn't hit the mark.

He'd been with girls before, more for the pleasure of it or the sense of personal triumph and he worried that this longing wouldn't continue past the loins.

No matter how he looked at it she just wasn't right for him that way. All the care and time she spent on his wellbeing was much too much like a mother or even a sister, and for a long time he'd considered her as such. Sneaking into the bathhouse to see her naked was just on of those boyish hobbies that was both titillating and challenging.

It wasn't until that one day when he'd seen her and felt his head drain not from an injury she caused him but from the spell her body put him under. From that moment on it was different, all of it, and while half of him ached to circle behind her, wrap that lean figure inside his coat and hold her the other half shouted stubborn advice about "You'll burn each other out like a candle and then what?" "You're going to ruin your partnership for a screw?" "She's too much of a lady for the likes of you." And so on.

At that moment Soul was torn from his nightmares, Kid's confusion and inner debate swirled like a tide pool dragging him down, and Black Star's frustrations howled as fiercely as the winds of Tibet, and all this insanity was food for the Kishin who woke, struggled against his bonds and sent the whole platform lurching.

*.*.*.*

more when I get some sleep.


	8. Love me don't leave me

Thanks so much for the reviews, I have as much fun reading them than I do writing this.

*.*.*.*

The jolt sent everyone lurching to starboard, rudely woke Kim and Patti, and threw the whole grew into a dead quiet. Outside thoughts, words, movements, all were frozen as Weapon and Mister alike cautiously explored the same question:

"What the fuck was that?"

Soul and company burst from the tent as another ripple and the telltale clank of metal confirmed what they all suspected.

Krista was the last person to draw their weapon but the first to act. "Riley!" She reached back for his hand, her other digging in one of the many pockets at her belt.

Soul was sure Riley had become a throwing knife that afternoon, but when the partners' hands touched it was Krista who transformed, her bright light forming an incense burner, and the herbs from her pocket burned to become something more than smoke.

There wasn't time to question which one of them was really the Meister or which the Weapon, if the Kishin wanted to struggle it was their job to beat the notion out of him.

His blade was ready, and he would watch carefully if the metal broke by one of those grotesquely animated sleeves. 

While Krista's smoke circled around, snuck through the cracks to try and sedate the demon, Kim's magic pulsed as she struggled to reinforce the web that kept him down.

Another violent shudder disrupted no one's footing, they were wound like springs and ready for the worst.

"Kim, watch out! He's storing his power for a—" Two bullets, one blade, and a set of throwing stars intercepted the "hand" that burst through solid metal to grasp at the good witch.

"Kid! He's too strong! He's feeding off something…" Kim winced as she threw a wash of power into the spell.

"Everyone, clear your minds…" Krista's silent partner seemed to speak on her behalf—that, or his voice was just naturally so delicate during major world crises.

The group took a moment, focused, found their Zen, and when more arms burst through the weakened barrier they met it head on—focused on their one and only goal of destroying the monstrosity before them.

Three sets of Resonance flooded the small craft with power, barraged Kishin, and a change of herbs gave the rest of the team the extra push they lacked without their partners.

Kid sent volley after volley of bullets into the opening in the metal dome, Black Star and Tsubaki fought with Demon Sword to cut away the dozen odd arms grabbing for the crew, and Krista was now thuribles, connected by the same thick chain: one of sleep toxin and the other a stimulant for Soul and Kim.

With nothing but the dull echo of the group's former troubles, Kishin quickly drained away the power he'd grabbed moments earlier, but the demon was a wily one.

Black Star's attack missed target as the appendages retreated back through the opening.

"Kim, seal it up!"

Tanuki magic reversed the damage, but not before one deadly quick fist shot through the last crack of opening to land Soul square in the chest. Black Star cut it down before it could do any real harm, but the force of impact had him tangling painfully with the safety rail.

Metal cracked under the pressure of repair and then the hole was gone, a general disarray of people and supplies the only proof of a disturbance.

" S'it over?" The blue haired ninja held Tsubaki tightly, not ready to trust the quiet.

"Li's setting him to sleep." Riley explained, and as Soul rubbed the soreness under his ribs he realized the boy hadn't moved much except to wave the chains and spread the smoke. He made a mental note to ask him later about this inter-changing weaponry bit.

"Li?"

"That's what he calls me." It wasn't the strangest thing the group had ever seen but Krista's face materializing out of a whiff of glowing smoke was up there in the top five.

"Things should be ok now, I'll spend a while putting him all the way under so if you could keep your thoughts on something simple, maybe…daisies. That would be great."

Like a mechanic popping in and out from under the hood she was gone again, and a general feeling of ease mixed with sickly apprehension passed between the friends.

The group exchanged a sideways glance with many a raised eyebrow before turning to Kid, who's response was to shrug and let Liz and Patti out of gun-form.

"Weeee daisy time!"

"No, bed time." Liz corrected, taking her sister by the hand to straiten out the tent.

She doubted anyone would get much sleep tonight, but that wasn't particularly healthy for a growing girl.

Soul watched the sisters fuss over the snapped poles and collapsed cloth, knew he was too riled up to sleep, but wasn't really sure what to do about it. He wanted to talk to Riley about his partner and their blood abilities, more than anything wanted to find a way to see Maka, but neither of those were "simple" and he wasn't sure how seriously Krista wanted them to take this daisy thinking.

Instead he waited, played some piano in his head, and when a half hour went by he took the ripple and release of the only Resonance on the ship as a sign that Krista was finished.

The white haired weapon stretched, noted that Kim and Black Star were resting near Tsubaki with tea, and felt a twinge of pity to see Kid standing where he had for most of the journey.

Smoke sifted out of infinitesimal cracks in the metal cage, and when it had collected Krista returned to human form, still held by the stiff boy who wielded her.

"Well?" Kid demanded a report.

"It should be ok, but this crew should be careful what they dwell on."

Krista was a girl of small constitution, and while her coconut brown skin glistened with effort and her hands trembled her big blue eyes shone with calm and sparked a strange kind of energy that reminded him of Maka on a good day.

She probably needed some sleep, but he wanted some answers.

"So the two of you are weapons?" Trying not to be rude he phrase it to be more of a compliment than a question.

"That's right." 

"How did you…" Soul rolled his fingers, feeling more foolish than he'd hoped as he realized there really wasn't a way to have this conversation without a foot going into his mouth at least once. .

Krista smiled and gave Riley's shoulder a pat, a silent signal to be set down, and so she was.

Once on her feet she continued.

"Riley was my Meister originally, but a few years ago he went…a little berserk during a mission."

More than half the available ears were leaned towards the conversation now.

"I was scared we'd be split up, so I learned how to wield him. I'm not very good at fighting…but it does help to know a little knife work now and then."

Soul just nodded, mulling over his own situation, comparing it to theirs, finally he turned to the tall army man and said directly. "Where your parents weapons?"

At first he wasn't sure Riley would speak to him—or could—but when the answer came it didn't help as much as he thought; "No."

"Riley-boy's from a long line of Meisters." Her hand patted his, dark on pale, and the red hair in her weapon's eyes covered any further response as he bent his head.

"Well, that's pretty cool. Sorry if I'm a bit nosy…"

"And what are we, chop soul residue?" With a flick of hair Liz left her sister sleeping in the tent. "Patti and I switch all the time and you've never been interested before."

"Ah….never really thought of it that way I guess."

Neither had Kid.

His attention perked though he hid it as he quietly titled towards the discussion. Why Soul would be interested in transcending Meisters and Weapons he didn't know, but Liz and Patti had one more escape rote he'd somehow overlooked: They could become their own pair. Patti was a wiz with fighting and Liz was a smart weapon.

Because these worries were probably what woke Kishin in the first place he decided to call home, give his father the update on their little misstep.

It wasn't a report he was looking forward to.

*.*.*

Four days later the jet landed on time, as expected, and while the party slugged their way down the runway there were eager friends waiting for them.

Maka flung her arms around Soul, pulled him down to lay a grateful, anxious kiss on his forehead.

"How was it?"

It was an unusually grey day in the desert, and Maka's smile was the brightest item on the launch pad. Her friends and colleges seemed too tired or meditative to keep their own lights lit.

"Well?"

Soul made a conscious effort to smile and nonchalantly explain there'd been a small incident but nothing they couldn't handle.

Maka didn't buy it.

"Tsubaki…" But the girl in question slept quietly in her Meister's arms, and Black Star shot her a look that hissed; "Don't. Wake. Her. Up."

She settled for the knowledge that the trip was obviously more trouble than they were expecting.

Because they knew the school grounds like their own backyards the group cut through the gymnasium knowing the kids would be in class or spilled out over the entrance. .

Maka waited before trying to trying once more to lighten the mood. She flashed her smile at Soul, elbowing his chest lightly to tease at the way he dragging his feet.

When she heard him hiss and the color drained from her cheeks.

"Hey are you…" Another glare from Black Star had her glaring right back, and frustrated with her lack of results up till now Maka grabbed Soul and dragged him into the boys bathroom.

Aside from minor protests from her partner the gym went cricket quiet as all eyes fixed on them.

Kim and Krista exchanged similar looks of "….oh my!"

They burst through the door-Maka's angry foot sent it swinging wide—and before Soul could ask what the big idea was a squeak from one of the students tore his Meister's attention away.

"M-Maka-sensei!" Though he was just washing his hands at the sink the dark haired boy looked mildly violated.

She shot the student a sweet but sharp smile "Don't worry Tim, this is a personal matter of the purest intentions."

That said she yanked Soul's shirt from his pants and held it high.

The resulting sound of scampering feet and a hastily closed door was trivial.

"Maka what the—OW!"

She'd jerked his arm in the wrong direction, and the bruise, black and terrible against his ribs was more painful than it should have been.

Some of her anger melted as she eyed the damage, but Maka kept strong even as her fingers traced the injury sympathetically. "Why didn't you have Kim heal it?"

"She's had better things to spend energy on."

Her eyes shot into his. "Did Kishin get out?"

"No." He tried to answer quickly to avoid suspicion, but that same speed betrayed him.

"He did…for a little while. Didn't he?"

"…yeah."

Pale fingers traced the multi-colored wound before they went searching for more.

The gasp when she found more of the same on his other side, vertical, and looking worse than they felt made him want to puff his chest and claim it didn't hurt.

She kissed his chest dearly, gingerly set the cloths she'd disrupted back into place.

"Next time I'm going with you! No buts. Not even Shinigami buts."

Her partner just smirked with one of his white eyebrows raised as if to say "what good would that do?"

Well, he thought, it certainly wouldn't have left him worrying day and night about her.

It was time to end that worry.

"Maka." Soul took her arms firmly, almost startling the woman under his hands with the seriousness of his nature.

"Are you alright?"

She blinked twice.

"Me?"

"Yes. After…the other night. Just, tell me you were on some kinda plan."

It took her a few seconds to translate his embarrassed lingo.

"…Yeah…for a few months now." She wasn't really sure where he was going with this but she could see it was an irritation and turmoil in his poor musically structured mind.

"You've been worrying about this since you left, haven't you?"

Damn the girl could read him like one of her books, but that was reason number forty-three why he loved her.

Because it just wasn't cool to kiss people in the men's bathroom he slid his grasp down her arms, took her hands from his chest and walked her home before driving her against the nice clean, sanitary wall and drowning in her laughter.

*.*.*.*

Chivalry wasn't really his strong point.

He could boast about rescuing hot babes or shout out his "conquests" to the school—much to the dismay of said conquestees—but romance as depicted in the movies and books his weapon was fond of was not in his set of skills.

Still, he could do this much.

You didn't need ninja skills to keep a girl asleep who hadn't been woken by the sounds of a jet landing—but he did his best.

Black Star set Tsubaki on her futon as carefully as he would have laid down a live bomb.

It was a sickeningly great temptation to run a hand through the black hair spilled a her shoulders, peak as he'd done a million times between the folds of her battle yukata, or brush his lips over her neck to catch that perpetually unique scent, but even someone like him knew better.

She'd completely worn herself out over the past week and he'd barely noticed, some Meister he was.

Tsubaki always had the inclination to take care of others, and he imagined it was one of her deeper, secret dreams to be a mother some day—which was evident during the time they'd taken in the little witch Angelia—and more than anything else he doubted he could give that to her.

Even if he loved her, married her—and by some miracle she loved him without those parent's eyes—children weren't in his plan. The Star clan's reputation was slowly coming around for the better, but he didn't want another child to live through the harsh world he'd learned to accept.

No, he thought, with an irritating little splinter of regret making his heart itch, it wouldn't do. He just wouldn't do. Not for her.

An hour later she woke from her dreams, groggily stumbled into the kitchen—completely unaware of how disheveled her clothing was or how it lit her Meister like a Christmas tree from top to toe.

"Ossu." He gulped out the greeting, suddenly both grateful for and annoyed by his Weapon's presence.

"Is it late?" She asked, a sleeved hand rubbing delicately over her face as she tried to blink the sleep away.

"Nope."

"Should I make you something to eat?" It was her first reaction to ask, but when she smelled the bacon and noodles—odd combination as it was—sizzling on the oven Tsubaki smiled with something she could only label as pride.

"Pop a seat, it's almost done."

The smile he flashed her could have killed, and while it sent a little thrill through her chest Tsubaki kept the pleasant smile and the gracious attitude she'd been brought up with like a mask.

The truth? Seeing him standing there looking so ridiculously out of place at her stove with a frying pan in one hand and cooking chopsticks in the other it made her feel like melting right there on the spot.

It was embarrassing to admit that she felt a distinct pull to do more than melt, but she tried hard to ignore that. Just as she tried hard to ignore the desperate want in her heart to hold her Meister as she'd once been allowed, when it was innocent and decent. She couldn't tell anyone how much of a torment it was to watch him do those routine exercises of his and not be allowed to touch the sweaty sheen of his arms or back.

As Black Star humdrumingly served dinner and they ate in a pleasant quiet she mulled over the possibility that one day he really could be hers.

Aside from her long unrequited longing Tsubaki also keep still the secret of her parent's arrangement.

To be completely honest she was not a free woman, and her twenty-fifth birthday, which wasn't far off, hung over her head like a noose.

Because of her rare abilities as a Weapon and the power in her blood it was expected that she continue the family line, produce an heir, preserve the "blood."

No matter how you put it it all meant the same thing; make babies or be a disgrace

For a moment Tsubaki allowed herself to feel the full sadness of her brother's death, knowing that if he'd lived he would be partially responsible for this burden as well. Now it was her responsibility, only hers, and failure wasn't an option. At the moment her agreement was that she could spent her first twenty-five years looking for someone of suitable breeding.

Breeding, she thought bitterly, was the only thing on those stuck up old pig's agenda.

She had a formal fiancée waiting in Japan, a good boy she'd known since childhood who would…do. If all else failed Tsubaki knew he could make her happy, but god how much she wanted it to be Black Star.

If he would just marry her she wouldn't have to rush and pop one out to please the family court. And wasn't it a beautiful dream; an older Black Star running, challenging, playing as warriors do with a little girl or boy, that terrible smile stretched across a peaceful face and laugher echoing against her front porch.

As things stood now…the black haired beauty eyed her Meister carefully, noted that he made no conscious effort to seem more frivolous or civilized as men often did in her presence. She liked that about him, but it also meant he didn't have any current plans involving her and his personal life.

He was hardly the obnoxious, narcissistic boy he'd been in his early teens. Killing Mifune was part of that change, but in growing older he'd also grown gentler, more calculating, as she thought he would.

Her parents approved of him, and more than any other reason she was in love with him. It just didn't seem like he held the same.

Tsubaki took a deep breath as she set her chopsticks down. She didn't want to resort to pushing her feelings on him, but if she didn't start easing him into the idea now…

She had two years, and as she saw it they could date casually for one, wind their way into seriousness for the other, then, to please her family they'd marry with legalities but possibly continue down the road of two exploring lovers. Children could wait, her biological clock was still ticking just fine, and once she married the deal was sealed. Oh they could bother her to speed it along, but no one would hold her life over her head ever again.

What happened with the Kishin, however, made her waver on this resolution. On the one hand she wouldn't be thinking about troublesome things, but Black Star probably would. It would just be setting one flame to extinguish another.

The other matter was the encroaching "visit" from Hiruki, no doubt shoved down his throat by his grandparents—who were just as eager as her own to get the "family merger" underway. If she didn't have anything concrete to tell him…a reasonable excuse not to accept his hand now…

Bracing herself for the worst possible outcomes Tsubaki stood up to collect the dishes as routine dictated.

"That was delicious, thank you. I'm sorry I didn't wake up sooner."

"Don't worry about it." Her Meister pivoted in his seat to watch her, much the same way she'd done earlier.

"You were really conked out there for a while." The sideways glance she allowed him showed the concerned dip of his eyebrows and mild pout on his lips.

Very agreeable.

"I suppose." She sighed in a way that sounded displeased, and after a beat added "Thank you for carrying me home."

Tsubaki heard the chuckle and pressed her luck. "I must have been heavy with all the luggage too."

A laugh, a haughty self-important laugh and smirk and she knew she had him.

"Not for me."

"Probably not." Her smile gave away nothing, but teased him to argue even as she twisted to showcase a bit of her figure. "All that preservative food and no exercise probably added a few pounds though…"

She added a pout, sprinkled a little self-doubt as she fished for his compliment and his inevitable offer. It was a great game.

"Eh, I wouldn't say so." Outside he shrugged but inside a million alarms blared as his body picked up on her feminine whiles.

Suddenly everything changed, that terrible angle of her hip towards him was gone and she had the scowl of a mother hen as she approached him, soapy pan in hand and demanding that she'd _had_ put on weight, and dared him to try it again.

Taking a mental sledgehammer to those blaring alarms Black Star stood up, just a few inches taller now, and set his hands at her waist.

To appease her mood he lifted her high. Then, to prove her _especially_ wrong he kept her up there with just one hand as the other took the frying pan from her, a temporary but arrogant display. He brought her down slowly because the drumming of blood in his ears wouldn't let any reasonable thoughts through.

Tsubaki smiled in her kind way, but behind that gentleness was pure victory, and more than a little nerves.

She saw him flinch when her arms circled around his neck, watched his eyes twitch back and forth as he tried to calculate what that meant.

Even as her feet touched the ground her hands didn't come free, and neither did his.

Tsubaki had seen this look on him before, the look he got when he saw a girl he wanted—which was victory—but wasn't sure he should take—which she would count as partial victory. If he wanted her, there was no loosing.

Her eyes darted away for just a moment, and Black Star wondered if she would squirm away from him, but those big black eyes were back on his like floodlights, begging to be read.

The trouble was he couldn't read her.

What did she want him to do? This had started so…normally. Now the air was sticky and he couldn't breath. If she kept this up, kept her arms firm around his neck, nobody would let go.

Then it occurred to him.

Nobody would let go.

It was sheer force of will that kept him from lifting her again just to hear her gasp of surprise before he took what he'd dreamed of taking, what she was offering, but this was _Tsubaki_. What she wanted tonight…damn it all wouldn't she wanted it tomorrow? And all the tomorrows after that? That's how she was.

"Tsubaki…" The ninja reached blindly, grasped her small hands and pulled them down.

Never one to miss the signs she understood right away.

Understanding didn't make the pain any less real.

"Oh?" It wasn't exactly protocol but it was all that would come out.

"Sorry…I…you're great, but I can't be the guy that breaks you."

"Breaks me?" What did he mean, her heart? Her future? Body? What?

He tried to smirk through the shaky explanation. "You know me. It would burn up like that. I'd be on to the next girl in a week, just watch."

Black Star certainly wasn't expecting her laugher, but it didn't ease him any.

"Is that what you think of yourself?" She gave the toughened face a loving pet. "Have more confidence than that."

"It's not confidence it's fact." He tried to step away but the table stopped him.

Fact. It sounded so hurtful, so painful. At the moment she hated that word.

She sighed, decided her Meister deserted the truth.

To make things more comfortable she sat back down on their floor cushions, inviting him to do the same.

"Black Star…you know my powers are special."

His eyebrow lifted at the seemingly sudden change.

"Sure. You're the best ninja weapon ever."

Her eyes sought his, and there was a kind of pleading there he didn't yet understand.

"I'm suppose to…I'm expected, to pass that line of blood on. If I don't find someone on my own the council has supplied a young man to…to do the job."

The room took a nosedive and everything looked off balance.

"Pass…on…supply…do the job?"

Hearing the raise in his voice she tried to calm him, knowing that he would be angry over this 'destiny' of hers was part of his character. A piece of the reason why she loved him.

"He's a nice boy, we use to play as kids but…I was hoping…I could choose you."

Forget off balance, this was a spinning wheel.

"To have a kid?"

"Not now. Not for a few years. If I'm married in two years I can live my life at my own leisure, though, yes, a child is expected. Eventually." The beg in her black orbs went on overdrive. "But I would be free."

"Free…"

"And my parents adore you, you're wonderful with Angela, and I—"

"Tsubaki…I can't."

"I'm not…" A hand gestured to her curves and face.

"No! You're…" Nervously he scratched at the back of his head. "You're…" A puff of air was all that remained of that train of thought.

"I just can't do the whole…kids n' marriage thing. I won't let someone else go through what happened to me."

The words hung like lead in the air, and because Tsubaki understood all too well what he meant she wanted to hold him that much more.

"Things are different now, you've done so much to improve the your family's name…"

"There's still a lota bastards out there who hold a grudge. And for good reason."

"The world would be a beautiful place for our child, we would make it beautiful just be being there—" Her hands went for his arm but he grabbed her first.

"You're like a sister to me Tsubaki!" He didn't want to tell her that lie. He didn't want to see the dreams in her eyes crushed so violently but if he wasn't careful….

"Oh…" Her eyes took to the floor, her head bowed in that servitude way that sometimes made him want to scream. "Sorry."

He wanted to make her laugh, to laugh the whole problem away, but all he could do was try and not look like the bad guy.

"You've got two years, you'll find someone who'll wanna give you everything you want, somebody really great." Even as the promises flew off his tongue there was a deep burn inside him that wanted to scorch out whoever this imaginary person was.

"And ya know, if you don't find him I'll marry you and you can keep looking! That way the old geezers won't be down your neck right?"

Tsubaki did her best to smile cheerfully because she knew it was what he wanted. "Yes…that would help."

"Awesome."

His big grin and her quiet smile might as well have been made of plastic.

Black Star gave his Weapon a friendly pat on the shoulder, took the pan from the table and went to the sink to finish the dishes.

"I…I think I'll have a bath." Her knees trembled, and she prayed she would make it to the tub before she all but collapsed.

That night Black Star dreamed of a hospital, Kid's hospital, except every room was a morgue and all was dark as death. At the very end a boy with midnight blue hair and a star shaped birthmark lay very still on a shiny operating table, his little body riddled with holes and pale as the moon. In the distance he heard Tsubaki's bitter weeping, the cries of a mother who'd lost their child, and that sound haunted him even as he woke to a new day.

*.*.*.*

A deep grey thundercloud hovered over the Nevada dessert, bringing with it the whip of wind and storm and the chill of water in the atmosphere.

Perfect for a day in the flowers, Maka thought.

As the years wore on she found that the only real way to reset her mind and stop the hum a work-related headache was to toss away the books, switch her battle gloves for garden armor and take to the small beds behind the house.

She didn't know much about flowers, so she sought out Kid at first, but it turned out he only knew how to trim hedges symmetrically, so books had her answers—as they always did.

Right now her problem could not be solved by a trip to the library. It was one she would have to put into practical application if she was going the get the answers she wanted.

Over the past week she'd been working on a portable resonance reader, attachable at the wrist, that would _also_ monitor the density of your wavelength. It wasn't easy, but with Stein's technology pretty much perfected it was up to her to improve the RIM and shrink it down.

Her biggest question at the moment was what maximum number to allow it. The larger the number the more calculations it would need to do the bigger the microchip she needed.

She and Soul had one of the highest documented Resonances, but they'd never measured it specifically during battle. At the moment they couldn't afford to go looking for random fights, but they _could_ measure it another way.

The idea made her laugh through a delighted smile.

It was something she'd wondered about for a while, how powerful their Resonance would be while as they shared and took, or even slept together.

Really it was pretty logical. Resonance was so much more potent when your connection was strong, influenced by nothing but your partner, and what stronger connection could there be than sex?

It was just a matter of getting her Weapon to play along.

*.*.*

Meanwhile, unknowing of Maka's conniving plans, Soul decided it was time to put some of the book smarts that had been shoved down his throat to good use.

Already he'd asked Stein for help but the doctor didn't know much beyond the abnormal cases—the ones that were interesting to him and devastating to Soul—though it seemed cases like Maka's were far and few between.

People were either born weapons or they weren't, but the time when that weapon blood showed seemed to vary between households and type. The youngest recorded case…that Stein hadn't known. So it was up to the books.

Two hours later a heavy, dusty, book went flying across the table as Soul gave in to frustration.

"Damn it…"

"Oy. Didn't someone teach you to have more respect for literature?"

The white haired Weapon almost cringed. Of all the people who could have wandered into the restricted section it _would_ be his Meister's father.

Spirit nonchalantly lifted the heavy text from the table. "Weapon genealogy and DNA?" He scoffed at the boy's feeble scholarly attempt. "Why would you wanna know this stuff?"

When Soul's red eyes shifted to the floor it clicked in the seasoned Death Scythe's head like a sticky clock hand.

"…"

Soul was just about to act on the idea of sneaking out while the man still looked too shocked to move when that deadly scythe sliced strait through the table.

The thunder of a stack of books falling to ground, the shattering of wood, and the indecent screams of a livid parent caught the attention of half the school.

"YOU LITTLE BASTARD!"

*.*.*.*

oh dear….poor daddy.


	9. A bottle of chance

Well, aside from vicious mood-swings and general lack of any motivation to do anything except watch movies on netflix, just editing this chapter was a struggle.

I literally had to bribe myself to finish editing this. Here it is.

*.*.*.*

"Get back here! You cretin! Thief! Pedophile!"

Following each curse came a deadly swing of the enraged father's scythe, and though Soul managed to escape each attempt the study hall would never be the same.

"Oy! Incase your pervert ass hasn't noticed she's twenty! Gah-!"

Spirit sliced through the bookshelf Soul took cover behind, followed hot on his trail as the younger man ran for the back wall, and seeing him sufficiently cornered reverted back to good old fashion fist work. "That's not the point!"

"Man…" The idea of beating up an old Death Scythe wasn't exactly one he enjoyed—most of the time—but as things were going this could easily be considered self defense.

A fiery fist went strait for his nose and Soul caught it firm, his own temper rising fast.

If Spirit wanted to play rough that was all well and fine, but he'd be damned if he just sat still while the man pulverized him for no reason other than his own hurt pride.

Soul caught Spirit's left hook as it sang past his ear, pushed against the older man with a strength that caught him off guard.

Spirit refused to give his only precious child to this mongrel, but if the boy's rare few virtues were going to flash around like sequined bobbles it was gunna be difficult.

He didn't like difficult things.

"Give me back my daughter's honor you creep! No good albino…."

"Hey I didn't…" On second thought…"Ok, maybe I—" "AAAAAAH!"

Bad second thought.

To Soul's grim satisfaction the head-butt meant for him ended up in the wall behind him, and the moan of pain from his—good god—probably future father in law allowed him a smirk for victory without any guilty conscious.

"Now will you listen to me a damn minute?"

The ginger haired Death Scythed clutched his head, bent into his knees and told him to stick his words somewhere unpleasant.

"Does it help at all that I love her?"

A glare wasn't exactly what he was hoping for but it _was_ a step down from rancid blood-thirst.

This wasn't a conversation he'd been looking forward to, he knew at some point he must confront her overbearing, overprotective father, but that didn't mean he had to like it. And this was not the best of times, as he was not in the best of moods. It didn't help at all that Soul's dream of their monster scythe child had become a recurring one and that nobody on this damn planet seemed to have the answers he wanted. Talking to the hotheaded Spirit Albarn was suppose to be his last resort.

If the man could just tell him he'd gone through the same agony Soul might be able to write it all off as an overactive imagination tangling with an unreasonably guilty conscious.

For Spirit there would be no delicate way to put this, so Soul chose to be blunt and prepared for the worst.

"Did you ever worry that Maka might be a weapon?"

The older man's eyes narrowed. "…. I would have loved my daughter no matter what she was."

"But did you ever think, if she was a weapon, she could have hurt her mother?"

The air took on a light chill as Spirit tinkered with what Soul was getting at.

"I know she's got Scythe blood. I don't…well, I'd love her no matter what she is too but…we've both got it so…do you think if—" and he tried to put this very gently, raised his arms ahead of time just incase "—we got married and had a kid, do you think it would be a danger to her life before it was born?"

Soul slumped down against the wall when he was sure the stunned look on Spirit's face meant he wouldn't get the living daylights beat from him, dragged a hand through his hair and opened more of himself to the tedious senior scythe than he'd planned. Told him of the nightmares when they were kids, how this felt just the same but so much worse, all the dead-end research he'd done and how none of it eased any of his burden.

The young man winced a bit, realizing how un-cool he must sound and added with a hopefully unnoticed drop in voice tone. "Maka doesn't know, so…. if ya don't mind keeping quiet about it."

Peeking around his peripherals he noticed Spirit had taken to the wall as well, his head's hurt forgotten for the time.

"Well…" The older man stood up, straitened his dusted black suit and prepared for the tornado of pain the librarian would put him in when the little man finished clambering down the stairs.

"…well…"

*.*.*

Much later, after an Oscar worthy chew-out from the librarian and the penalty of cleaning up the whole second floor Soul finally ambled through his front door.

"Maka?" He smelled dinner simmering on the stove but his Meister didn't seem to be nearby. Curiously he peaked around the corner but she wasn't at the table, nor the living room, not the bathroom, or even the bedroom.

There weren't any signs of struggle—unless it was a professional job by highly trained do-no-gooders—so the man assumed for the moment that she was simply at the store getting one last minute forgotten ingredient.

Which was partly correct.

The wheels of her bike tumbled over the uneven cobblestones as Maka raced back home, the last essential piece of machinery in her backpack and an anxious gleam in her eye that could have rivaled Stein's on a "mellow" day.

Ox called just as she was setting the stew to boil, and though she whined about leaving dinner, his reasoning—based around one very tired Tanuki witch—won out in the end.

Figuring 'simmer' to be a safe bet Maka sped down the four block distance, grateful that bicycles didn't adhere to the traffic laws regarding velocity, and felt the itch tingling in her fingers to attach the final piece of her tiny puzzle.

She hoped to arrive before Soul, but the telltale shape of a motorcycle under lock and tarp proved otherwise. Ah, well.

Maka prepared for a little bit of scolding—he never liked it when she left the stove unsupervised—as she peeked into the kitchen, only to be blown back by a surprisingly sudden wave of pure, molten female lust.

It didn't have much to do with the cup of coffee in his hands, just barely at his lips, the debonair way he leaned against the counter, stirring the pot without sending it so much as a glance, not even the droopy, unfocused look in his eyes or the fact that she could practically hear the music he was writing in his head. No, she was beaten by the simplicity of cloth.

Soul dressed nicely as a rule, but every once and a while he managed to put together something so spectacularly easy, masculine, and irresistible it drove her crazy not to kiss the collarbone—exposed by the one loose button—and tug at the leather string of his necklace.

It was a terrible temptation to sink her teeth into him right that moment, switch off the burners and forget about dinner.

And why resist?

But before she lost all brain function completely Maka hurried to ensure this chance wouldn't be wasted.

It didn't take long to set RIM up under the bed, switch it to digital so there'd be no noise, and still make it back before he realized she hadn't come strait to him.

Soul, meanwhile, was still deciding if he should Maka about his run-in with Spirit. On the one hand she was likely to hear the rumors around school or catch it directly from the distraught librarian. On the other, telling her would involve either a bit of lying or a confession he wasn't sure he was ready to make.

That was the inner battle she unknowingly interrupted, burning his thoughts to a cinder with the heat of her tongue and touch and sent him rocking back in surprise.

He barely had time to hook his thumbs into the belt loops of her jeans, steadying himself after the crash of her body into his and keeping her snug against him.

"Hi there." Maka mumbled across his lips, shining just a glimpse of her smile his way before attacking the collarbone she couldn't resist.

"Hey." It wasn't the manliest of responses, chocked by the spasm of his throat and more of whimper than a greeting, but his partner didn't seem to care—and neither did he.

Dinner could wait.

Using the grip on her pants he hoisted her up, one quick jerk of strong arms had her in there air, the skilled pivot of hips kept her there, and he smirked against her laughter at the liquid easiness with which she wrapped around him.

Trusting her grip he took one hand to switch off the burner before stumbling into their room, already infected with the mist that clouded her eyes and warming in steady layers from the quick touch of her fingers or playful nipping of teeth.

He didn't care what brought this on, he intended to enjoy it.

Hands, mouths, hair, whose was whose began to blur and time became something irrelevant as Maka discovered that even someone she'd known all her life could suddenly taste so different. He felt the same, looked the same, but something was different. Maybe it was another luxury of their newfound intimacy, maybe it was just the mood or the way they'd started but something was missing. Not a bad missing, more like the sweetness was gone, replaced by an exotic spice too foreign to identify.

As they drove each other closer to the edge, further from relevance, she became addicted to that strangeness, found that it blended perfectly into their world.

A moment from climax she remembered, through the hazy deliciousness of it all Maka remembered her plan and called out for her Weapon.

"Resonate with me…"

The phrase tickled Soul's ears as she purred it, her arms wrapped around his neck and damp cheek pressed to his own.

'Resonate?"

Why did he suddenly sink to a 1.3 GPA?

The request was simple, but he wasn't sure he had the strength or control to take his mind off anything but the woman wrapped around him.

Before Soul could protest he felt her half of the link pulling him, encouraging and demanding to be met, and it almost shocked him how strong she was on her own.

When half became whole the entire apartment shuddered, lazily stacked books topped onto the floor and a small whirlwind sent the curtains loose to dance in the air.

They rode that wave of power till the end, drinking in the taste of it and the pulse of something discovered for the first time.

Later when Maka went to check the readings her eyebrows nearly jumped right off.

*.*.*.*

"Now you're sure you want us to do this to your hair?" Liz asked for the fifth time.

"Yes, I am certain." Tsubaki smiled encouragingly from her seat at the slightly younger woman's glass Vanity.

"I mean, it's not like there's no going back—but…" Maka peaked around the other side of the plush chair, a case full of instruments held open and ready for Liz.

"Oh, trust me. I've been thinking about this for a while."

"Yaaaay do it do it do it!" Patty chanted in lively tune from the bed.

"Ok….here goes…." Liz almost winced as she took to the task at hand.

Fifteen minutes and a five inch pile of hair later the girls stood around the mirror in awe at their friend's transformation.

"Well? What do you think?" Tsubaki practically beamed—more than happy with the change and what it symbolized.

"Wow…" Maka let out a whistle that would have made an construction worker proud as she toyed with fresh ends of her friend's raven hair.

"Not too bad if I do say so myself." Liz proudly set the scissors away, considering her job complete.

After the humiliating night nearly a week earlier Tsubaki decided it was time for a change. And damn it all, she'd had that long, strait, hair since she was a child. She deserved a little rebellious, frivolousness now and then, and setting it all into a frenzy of loose curls seemed about right.

As she admired it now, how the simple turn of her head sent a handful of the ringlets splaying across her cheeks Tsubaki felt truly proud.

The length wasn't that dramatic either, just a few inches off so it could all fit in the rollers—though that had been the most daunting.

"Thanks for doing this on your night off." The gentle woman shot an apologetic glance at Liz, and the whole room reassured her that this was what female sleepovers were all about.

Tonight the boys were shunned—even Kid from his own home—while the girls celebrated the trio's return after their Meister realized how stressful and unsanitary it was to stay aboard the transport throughout the entire trip.

For the last leg of the journey he would wait here with his father and rest before the final effort to destroy the anomaly once and for all.

The first thing Liz wanted was a shower, a hot shower, and because their "mansion" was just that there was no need to fight for one.

But just to be stubborn she took Kid's.

Which lead to a rather hilarious argument about why he couldn't "just come in and get his damn shampoo" and "don't you have any decency."

It was simple fun and games of course, not to mention a wonderful little slice of revenge, and if she got to see her Meister stripped to the pinstripe pants because that was all he threw on after barely remembering about soap and huffing down two flights of stairs to get it then all the better.

"Liz?"

Coming out of her happy thoughts the woman found three pairs of eyes blinking in curious suspicion.

"….What?"

*.*.*

Another sour note added to the cloud of thought above Soul's head.

It wasn't enough he had to worry about deciding whether or not to spend the _rest of his life_ with someone, the piano just had to be off tune.

With an exasperated sigh he slammed down the dust box, wincing even as it made him feel just a bit of that stress eaten away.

What they'd done two nights before…there weren't even words to describe, the best he could do was translate it into a full-blown choir with soaring violins and heart shattering piano overtones.

Which didn't really do it justice anyway.

And even though they were so young, even though they'd only known one another he was sure he'd never find anything so magnificent with someone else.

Or anyone who'd laugh with him at all the stupid, ridiculous nonsense of their day-to-day lives. Like RIM catching _fire_.

As they rolled down off the high of power and physical peak Soul had gradually noticed smoke coming from under their bed. He'd leaned on his elbows, peered over Maka's head to investigate and waited just one beat before commenting:

"Man, we're hot."

It was stupid, incredibly stupid but her pearls of laughter as she scrambled to save her little machine outweighed the embarrassment of such a cheesy line.

Besides, when your head's spinning and you're not sure if you're even breathing you don't have much filter over what your brain things compared to what your mouth lets out.

And, he thought with a well-deserved smirk, there was no way he'd give that woman up before they had a chance to do _that_ again.

So why even consider it?

The only choice left now was the words.

*.*

The bugs were still crawling in his stomach when he picked her up from school a few hours later.

Per usual his motorcycle warranted a great amount of attention, but Maka was all too used to the routine and not as impressed with the great mechanical monster as she once was—as the young students still were.

He wanted to ask her right that moment, as they whipped through the wind and the town flashed by as quickly as their lives seemed to be, but the wrong response or reaction might cause an accident—worst and best case scenario—so he held off till they stopped at their door.

It was a little challenging but he managed to dismount before she did, held her with hands on hips as he blinked, wide-red eyed up at the woman he loved.

She gave him that temperamental, cheeky look of "What? I can do it by myself." But before she could voice it he blurted:

"Promise your life to me?"

*.*.*.*

Tsubaki intended to spend the day hunting down Blair; because if anyone knew how to seduce the logic out of someone it was Maka's magical cat, and having her hair revamped was only step on one her "drive my idiot Meister insane" plan.

The most obvious place would be the Chupacabra hang out, but the other girls told her she'd just missed the feline seductress.

Next was the shopping center, then the school, and by sheer grace of fate Tsubaki finally found her sitting pretty at a little café.

"Blair!"

"Ah, Tsubaki. How's that peeping tom of yours?"

Because handing out insults and gossip was new to her Tsubaki blushed a little though she quickly responded, "Being a bit difficult, actually…Um! Which was why…why I wanted to see you…"

She tugged a strand of the newly styled hair out of her shirt and continued bravely:

"You're very good at that sort of thing, so I was wondering...if you could help me be more…well, appealing."

"Ah~."

Tsubaki wasn't sure if the cooing sound of recognition was a good thing or not, but Blair seemed enthusiastic now.

"Here." The scantily clad cat slipped a deep purple vial into the Weapon's hands, her yellow eyes sly and sexy. "Drink this riiight after you get out of the bath. Sometime between drying your hair and putting on your cloths."

"What's it….do?" Tsubaki tipped it, watched the liquid pool at the other end.

"Exactly what it needs to do."

*.*.*

Later that evening, when Tsubaki was satisfied with her after-dinner soak she went to the mirror, wrapped in her white towel, and rolled the little vial over her palm.

She wasn't certain how closely she was suppose to follow Blair's directions, so she played with her hair a while after letting it free of the head-wrap.

"It'll do exactly what it needs to do…" The tall woman repeated, more than a little wary about the whole idea now that she was standing naked in her bathroom about actually about to chug back some unknown, magical substance.

She tried to think positively, maybe it would make her smell irresistible and the scent was different for every person, maybe it would give her one of those soft glows from the old movies. Please just nothing ridiculous.

With those hopes in her head she uncorked the bottle, tipped it to her lips and drank it dry.

The taste was potent, like a sharp wine, but what lingered was sweet.

Tsubaki felt the room take a sharp dive.

"Ah!"

Black Star heard the distressed sound of surprise from his room, the thud of a body on wooden floor from the hallway, half a second later stood battle ready outside the bathroom door.

"Tsubaki?" He knocked, more than a little worried because clumsiness was not in her repertoire. He doubted it was even in her dictionary.

"Oy!"

Sharp pounding at the door only warranted a sickening lack of response.

"You ok?"

Because he didn't get an answer he did the next logical thing: kick down the door.

"Tsubaki?"

Later he would be proud of himself for not noticing right away that she was naked save one white towel, but for the moment his one and only thought was what in the hell happened?

"Hey, hey, speak to me!" He checked her pulse, found it a little low, felt her breathe and found it a little shallow, then searched the room with ever growing anxiety for anything that might have put her in this state.

The little bottle he didn't know he was looking for was long gone in a magical purple puff, a simple but helpful cover-up spell.

Gently he lifted his Weapon to get her off the hard floor, and when her head tilted back the blue haired ninja noticed for the first time that evening the change in her hair—and the lack of anything decent.

It was his red face Tsubaki saw when she came fluttering out of the one minute sleep Blair's potion was good for. "Hm?"

Her Meister's expression was comic to say the least, his brows full of worry and the rest of him like a deer in the headlights that wasn't sure whether to flee or enjoy, and as the haze drifted away she couldn't imagine why.

"Ya alright…?" His voice was a little deeper, probably from the effort of not letting himself squeak.

"Oh…" Alright? Why shouldn't I be? "I suppose…"

That's when she remembered she was more or less stark naked.

And that this was grand opportunity.

Why did she smell so good? Why did she have to be so soft _everywhere_. Why did what he could see and touch make him want that much more what he couldn't?

He knew why.

As he tried to shove those thoughts away he knew all too well why.

Her dark eyes blinked at him through long lashes, black wavy hair swirled through her shoulders, over the curve of her breast and he cursed fate bitterly.

"Sorry, I'm a little lightheaded. I don't know what's gotten into me…"

"You work too hard, that's what."

Was there a hint of scolding in his voice? There was something undeniably amusing about that.

"Oh it's the heat." She pressed a hand against his shoulder, bracing herself to stand, but Black Star had other plans.

"Heat nothing…"

Something about the grain and growl in her Meister's throat as he lifted her with one effortless swoop had her toes curling, and that was a force to be reckoned with.

'Just put her to bed. Nothing more. You're gunna stay calm god damn it.'

But however noble his thoughts he forgot one crucial thing; that his partner knew him better than anyone, that she was watching closely, and that she saw and accepted the lusting haze in his eyes.

More than anything else, it meant that while his words were lies they were also calculated, designed to hurt just a little to avoid worse damage later.

She saw that, and admired that, but it wasn't what she wanted.

She didn't want to be protected, and refused to accept this delusion.

Tsubaki waited till he set her on the bed before sliding her arms down his back, thrilled and a little humbled by the shiver of response she got.

"Tsubaki…" He seemed to plead with her, the broken wishes of a man staggering on the edge of logic, and her response was to cup his face, hold him close, and urge;

"Can't you live with me in the now? Forget tomorrow." Her lips touched his temple and he almost lost his footing.

"Forget the future."

They skimmed down past his ear and his fists twisted in the white cotton fluff.

"Where is the you who lived only for today?"

Blair was right, that little potion did exactly what it was need to.

*.*.*.*

"Promise your life to me?"

"Soul…" Her great green eyes filled with love, confusion, and questions. "…you mean like?"

"Like whatever that means to you…" Her partner's lips smothered her questions, protests, and left only the willingness of her arms around his neck for an answer.

: D um….more later


	10. Movie Magic

So, just for clarification, it's a year past the last chapter. (I know it's been forever since we had a liz/kid chapter. chp3 matter o' fact)

*.*.*

"You did this, so fix it. Fix it, or we'll find another Meister."

Those were the words she gave him three years ago.

Three years, he thought, and not a single slip up. Not until now.

*.*.*.*.*

Because Kid knew Liz was right the young Death God immediately cut himself off from any missions that weren't either routine or absolutely essential. He trained long, harsh hours with Maka, sometimes with Patty, until he'd more or less killed his previous existence.

Now a days he could efficiently fight against anything symmetrical, even if both enemy and location were perfectly geometrical, could still use the frustration of asymmetry as a potent weapon, and rarely spent his entire day worrying about picture arrangements and carpet lengths.

Which, really, was extremely freeing.

After a solid year without incident Kid very slowly began to trust himself, started accepting missions that risked the flaring of his "Symmetry Habit," as Maka put it, and ease back into the unrestricted duties of a true Shinigami.

Last night, he and company went after a long time rumored Kishin fanatic, a pair of twins who boasted their dark abilities and unsavory knowledge to the seediest crowds and thus warranted Shibusen's attention.

The risk was high, but the information the Society might grasp with their capture was too great to pass up, so Kid put himself to the highest test to date.

Sadly, all it proved was that some habits die hard. Very hard.

As he lay there on the hospital gurney now Kid tried to pinpoint exactly where he went wrong, whether it was the combination of pyramid setting and well choreographed enemies—an old weakness on both ends—or the provocation of their words that sent him over the edge.

A groan escaped through bared teeth as Nygus stitched what she could of the four-inch gouge in his chest and the pain in his battered temple throbbed in response.

He might have to think about this tomorrow…

Leaning into his pillow, eyes on the ceiling in unmistakable defeat Kid wondered how Liz was doing in the next room over. Not that it mattered anymore…The Shinigami's pale lids closed heavily. It wouldn't matter if he tried to put it right, that he'd protected them with his own body—in the end. He'd screwed up, and she would take Patty and leave…

He wasn't ready for that!

How could he live without them after all this time?

Out of pure defiance he hadn't even begun to look for two replacement Weapons…

So absorbed in his problems, Kid didn't notice when Nygus finished and excused herself. The fact that the lights went out didn't register. Even the pull of the sheets as someone sat down next to him he barely noticed 'til their hand cupped his face.

And his heart nearly ran away screaming.

In the moonlight he saw the face of his partner as dreamily as though she were a figment of his imagination, but the hand on his cheek felt so warm and real he knew the conflict between senses and mind was one-sided.

Her breath hitched, blue eyes traveled to the bandages on his chest, and when Kid felt the tremors in Liz's hand he imagined she must be holding back something terrible and loud, and prepared for the worst.

The hand at his cheek slipped down, ghosting over his neck and collarbone to rest on the bloodied spot in the fresh gauze.

Too confused by her actions, Kid didn't trust himself to speak or stop her.

Here was this woman, who by all rights, should have left him behind in the dust by now to choose some sane, safe, predictable Technician, with her eyes all aglow with tears.

Why?

He could only hope it meant somehow he was still important to her. 

"Forgive me…"

The words were off his tongue before he could stop and consider the pros and cons.

Her eyes snapped to his and for a moment Kid was sure Liz would eat him alive.

Instead, unpredictably, the woman _melted_.

Like the snap of a rubber band Liz flung herself at the very stunned boy wonder.

"You're such a dolt!"

Baffled beyond all recovery, Kid could only lift a weak and pale hand to her head and stare. "I…"

Hot tears on his chilled skin was such a new feeling, so strange and vibrant. Everything about her was so full of living, even when she pretended not to care about anything but her manicure she was so much more alive than he could fathom.

Kid wanted to move, to pet or stroke or whatever she needed, whatever would make her stop crying. More than that, he wanted answers. And as much as it would pain him to ask, he wanted clarity.

"Liz…I messed up. Do you remember what that implies?"

The blond demon gun heaved one ragged breath before collecting herself to look into the golden eyes she'd avoided three years before. "About that…I can't apologize for what I asked of you…"

Dread sunk into Death's stomach deeper than the offending wound.

"…because what I said I said for my sister's sake."

Her expression changed just a little, her hand lifted ghostily to touch him again.

"But I also said it for your sake…"

A well-kept finger traced down Kid's facial structures, now lengthened and defined with time into the face of a man.

The smallest of pauses drifted between Shinigami and woman, and Liz had no idea the tiny sparks her touch gave or the lingering need stirred beneath them.

"…I understand." He tried not to stutter. "But you realize that this was…necessary. Given the circumstances."

Kid caught the traveling hand, gave it a sharp squeeze and tried to pour that thought into his partner through large, liquid gold eyes.

How could he be so regal and childlike at the same time? Liz wondered with distinct longing and distain.

Rather than continue to be the deer in his headlights she focused on his injuries, remembered how he'd leapt in front of her as just she'd done years ago, taken a blow that would have killed a human like her.

That's right…Kid wasn't human. He could handle a barrage of assault and walk away with hardly a grimace later.

Absently her free hand—as her other had not yet escaped his—traveled to where his heart should be. Was it in there, beating?

"What are you doing?"

"Your heart. I was wondering if you had one."

Kid laughed and immediately regretted it.

"Sorry!" The fluster caught in her face as Liz panicked and shot out for the call button.

Another hand fell pray to Kid's accuracy and control.

He trapped them, placed her palms tightly against his chest as it racked with difficult breath.

"Here." He pulled her just so, a minimal invitation to smother him as she had moments before.

Caution read on her face like an open book but still he insisted, so Liz curiously obliged.

Even after filling out in the height and shoulder department Kid was still considerably thin, and fitting into his side without spilling over the bed took little effort.

Gingerly she set her head at his shoulder, and through the bone and muscle of his chest she heard the unmistakable sound of blood pumping with the constant rhythm of any normal human heart.

From there everything became very quite. All she heard was the drumming of life in his veins, her own breathing, and the light whoosh of air from the pair of lips just a fraction's distance off the top of her head.

It being a hot night in Nevada, Liz didn't mind the lack of bed sheets. It would make it that much easier, in fact, to get way later when he'd gone to sleep.

For while her brain was still trying to pick apart exactly what they were doing here she decided to look at it in the mean time as one of those 'stay with me' fits of clinginess that Patty was so prone to.

It was the feel of his fingers tracing the bandages on her back that stopped that thought in its tracks.

The light touch, the quickening of heart beats, it all screamed one thing.

One thing she had to ignore.

And while Liz's brain fought off thought Kid's was swimming in it.

How could make her stay?

Kid thought briefly of Maka and Soul, how they were promised to one another, vowed never to part till death.

"In sickness and health…" He mumbled—incoherently—to Liz, who only heard mumbled jargon.

A fairly simple solution really, except he was sure that those two were the love of each others lives, and you didn't just go around asking anybody to marry you. It took time, and, well…love.

But he_ did_ love her. That's what this was all about in the first place.

He'd come to love and cherish the two orphans he'd adopted, who in turn adopted him, and could hardly fathom life without either of the girls.

It would probably be more peaceful, true, but there was no fun in "peaceful."

And as Kid traced the edges of Liz's wrappings through the light shirt she wore he mused on how much sadder his life would be with no one around reassuring him that he wasn't a failure for leaving his picture frames 1/239th of an inch crooked.

He could see the scrutiny in her eyes as his partner tried to decide if he was delirious or just tired and it made him smile. The kind of half lazy grin that absolutely ruined Liz's self control.

She wanted to draw that smirk as his hands did her bandaging. Slither her fingers over his skin to drive him mad so that he'd want only her, look only at her.

If he hadn't grown into his good looks so devastatingly this wouldn't be happening. If he'd just stayed the cute little neurotic freak from six years ago, the one who—in his cutest moments of self pity and doubt or childishness—made her want to smother him in love and hugs and read him stories like Patty, she wouldn't be the victim of all these wants!

She'd just have to push it aside, as she'd always done. Build up yet another layer of immunity for "those sorts of things."

The thought of mounting that task brought on a new wave of exhaustion.

Liz's eyes drooped; something about the feel of his skin under hers was so lulling that she forgot about sneaking away and picking apart situations.

And as she drifted into sleep Kid was more than willing to let her do just that, to watch her blue eyes set under heavy lids, finally feeling the pull of his own.

The hand at her back became like a gentle vice, keeping her by his side for the rest of the night.

*.*.*.*

Seeing as how he _owned_ the hospital, getting the twenty one year old Shinigami released to bed rest the next day wasn't much hassle.

Liz, of course, protested with her greatest pouting face to date but the young man wouldn't be swayed. He wanted to go home and he would get his royal pain in the ass way.

Patty didn't have any opinion on the mater, and just sat gleefully in front seat of the car as they drove back to Death Mansion, looking as usual for the "shotgun."

*.*.* 

"Patty, would you get me the box of supplies the hospital sent home?" Liz called busily over her shoulder while scrubbing away at the lunch and dinner dishes left untouched from the day before.

"You're the boss apple sauce! Tehehe."

Once the dishes were done, lunch prepared and carefully arranged on the mahogany tray, she set the medical supplies in the crook of her arm and carried them up to Kid's room, calling for Patty to come eat her own lunch on the way.

At first glance, and second, and third, Kid seemed to be sleeping, propped against the generous stack of black and white pillows where the nurse left him earlier that morning.

It was an absolute waste to wake him when he looked so untroubled, but his dressings need changing every four hours and it was encroaching on twenty minutes till, plus he should eat and hydrate and…

Liz's worries seemed to become less and less important the longer she watched her Meister resting soundly. The un-kept black hair that fell into his face, the long lashes both dashing and innocent, and the slight part in his lips all played havoc on her priorities.

She could gladly spend the day sitting on the lush bed watching Kid sleep, maybe blowing through those lashes to disturb him every so often.

Then his eyes were open and on hers like a shot in the dark, and Liz nearly spilled the lunch from the start it gave her.

"You always did scare easily." He teased with the faintest hint of amusement, shifting just slightly to sit upright as he eyed the lunch tray hopefully.

"…yeah…" It was probably the dullest response possible but it was all she had left in her arsenal for the day. Everything else ran away.

The tray went over his lap, and a glass of water and a spoon were offered as Liz unveiled the curry plate.

At his raised eyebrow she gave a nonchalant shrug. "At least you only need one hand to eat it."

"Hm."

This looked suspiciously like home cooking, and while Liz could do just fine with an oven baking cakes and sweets her culinary adventures weren't always…well, they had an equal chance of being disasters, bland, or delicious.

Hoping for delicious—or at the very most bland—Kid scooped a spoonful, kept the snarl from his expression at the slight pull against his stitches, and warily popped a bite.

Liz waited through the chewing, the typically Kid pondering and considering, then felt a wave of relief when he went for a second taste.

"It's ok?"

"It's not as spicy as I had assumed."

She laughed lightly. "Of course. Nobody would feed a sick man chili."

His ears perked at the phrase. Had she ever referred to him like that before? Unlikely, but then again it could just be a figure of speech.

But damn it he _was_ a man, and since she'd made him lunch she was either planning to stay or fatting him up for the kill.

He'd just have to set things back the way he wanted.

"Now your pills." Liz held out what looked like little skull shaped candies when his plate was clean, watched closely as he swallowed them down.

"Thanks for the food."

"Sure. Take your shirt off."

With her head and most of her upper half leaning towards the floor for the medicine box Liz didn't see the scheming in Kid's eyes—or the light twinge of shock that she could be so blunt—even if she was just being "nursely."

He slipped out of the already unbuttoned dress shirt with little difficulty, though considerably more pain that what it took to raise a spoon.

Liz didn't miss this, and was very careful as she unwound the long cloth from his torso, holding back the desire to flinch at the sight of his open wound and run screaming for Patty. But she gagged back that whim and pressed forward, this was partly her fault, and she would set it right.

Cautiously she dabbed a shining layer of antiseptic and one of Nygus' herbal mixtures over the ridge of the offending hole in her Meister's chest, being extra careful of the line in his stitching where the skin looked red and irritant.

Some of the last flakes of blood clinging to the organic string came off onto the cotton ball she cleaned him with, and the overall look of the injury after a small, unskilled, round of nursing looked slightly improved if she did say so herself.

Still, it might have been a tad easier if Kid's eyes weren't stalking her every move.

"Arms up." She gestured as cheerfully as possible given the stress and strain, and went about re-wrapping his thin body.

Liz was cautions about grazing his sides or the slightly sculpted abdomen as she traded the wad of gauze back and forth, around and under, just like in the books. If she would beat this want—and she meant to—she'd have to avoid unnecessary contact.

When the process looked complete she tucked the remaining end in, and was rethinking whether or not to give it a little smoothing down when Kid executed the notion for her.

Much like the night before he assumed command of the hand he trapped in his own, brought her palm to smooth the ruffled cloth, pressing just firmly enough to surprise her and not torture himself. "Liz. About our agreement."

"Which one?" Keep your voice steady…

The tension swirling around her was like a silent triumph for Kid, and the confidence of it all eased him into his next move.

"The one about leaving." His golden eyes held her steady, wiling her to focus only on him and not what his hand was doing.

"Hm…" Do not gulp.

Smoothly he guided her hand to his lips, stopped there to let breath tingle over the little hairs of her knuckles.

"Will you be leaving Liz?" His head tilted just the slightest as he planted a slow kiss on her folded fingers. The half innocent, half smothering gaze did terrible things to her pulse, and she prayed he couldn't feel it in his tight grip.

"…No." Against better judgment and internal death threats Liz let the quivering word fall from her lips like water would have slipped through her trembling hands.

"Good." The smile on his mischievous face didn't seem very reassuring, but Kid released his prisoner and settled in comfortably against the pillows again. More at ease and content than he'd been in many years now that his home was back in proper order—or at least on the right track.

*.*

Liz left Kid's room with a much dignity as she could muster, but once beyond the door was free to hobble her way back down the stairs in a completely ungraceful daze.

What was that? What in the _world_ was **that. **

Young Death simply grinned at his own efforts. He remembered that move clearly—remembered Liz's reaction clearly—from the movie she rented four months ago.

Watching movies with Liz, or rather, watching Liz watch movies, turned into one of his favorite past times these last six years. Her selection wasn't always the most interesting—the majority being romantic comedies, a few good dramas, and a handful of action—but the way she reacted to each scene was what kept his attention.

She cried for fictional characters, laughed hysterically with a humor that sometimes surprised him, waited in total suspense during the climax, and as those romantic, sexy moments rolled by on screen her blue eyes would glaze over like she wanted to be right there in the action. Being nibbled instead of watching the nibblers, kissing rather than tilting her head subconsciously for a better view, and Kid sometimes made special note of what caught her undivided attention.

Though he never expected to use them in such a way.

It might have been sneaky but it got him what he wanted, it certainly wasn't unpleasant.

That though had him raising a meticulously groomed eyebrow and peel back yet another layer of his hidden desires.

It wouldn't be the first time he enjoyed touching his Weapon, nor was he a stranger to craving hers.

He'd just never really thought of it that way before. To him Liz was both the scolding mother and the spoiled child he had to deal with on occasion. In her and Patty he saw the missing pieces of the "normal family" he would never possess as a child of Death.

Even though she was beautiful—and didn't he know what many of the other Shibusen residents were thinking—it always seemed a little odd to picture himself kissing her the way they did in movies.

On the other hand, if he'd known that the taste of her would linger on his lips in the most delicious way he might have tried it long ago.

*.*.*

With lunch and medical troubles settled Liz felt it was more than appropriate to sink into her favorite recliner with a loud sigh of annoyance to express her exhaustion.

"We're officially hiring a maid…"

Because the idea had her whistling and dreaming happily about all the free time it would allow Liz eventually drifted off into the depth of her problems.

She thought about the night before, about their enemy—some old Kishin fanatics who wouldn't let it rest that their idol had been destroyed barely a year earlier—and about the words they spoke to Kid.

Anytime someone mentioned "fragment" the boy would go berserk. It was almost more than the opposite of what happened when he froze because of symmetry.

Kid still lost a part of himself, he lost his reason, but he blazed bright with a fiery purpose she didn't really think he understood.

When provoked that way her Meister would stop at nothing to get answers, and deep down with the rest of her insecurities that was something that frightened Liz.

"It's probably because of Noah…"

Before that sneaky bastard interrupted their lives Kid never once bothered with that word. Now…it was like an on-and-off obsession.

What made things all he more difficult to understand was that he never talked about that time he spent as prisoner, not to her anyway.

She really regretted that.

And wouldn't it just be too awkward to ask now? Especially when it wasn't causing them any disharmony as Weapon and Meister. Too much time had probably passed—though last night's episode made the matter pretty relevant.

"Black Star probably knows…"

"What do I know?"

If anything could cause instantaneous death via heart failure it was a bright blue haired ninja standing on your ceiling.

And her blood-curdling scream woke Kid and caught Patty's attention.

The younger Thompson sister dashed into the room, hands pressed together with the threat of a pretend gun.

It didn't take the young woman long to realize the intruder wasn't "gun" worthy, but she fired a few invisible rounds anyway. "It's Black Star! Pew!Pew!"

Liz didn't find it so funny, as she was now squirming in pain from pulling on her stitches when she jumped and knocked the chair over.

"What. Are you. Doing here?"

The tall man jabbed a thumb towards the kitchen. "Tsubaki wanted to bring ya some food."

Some of the pain and hatred melted. "Oh bless you…"

Black Star grinned widely as he lifted the petite woman from her uncomfortable predicament to set her right again. "Yeah, I get that a lot."

Liz was about to retort with something nasty when a painful 'thud' on the stairs sucked away her attention and air.

"Kid!"

Two flurries of blond hair ran for the man crumbled between the top and middle steps, and though he showed more restraint Black Star wasn't far behind them.

"Liz…what was that?" He asked through gritted teeth as his Weapons fondled over him—well, Patty most sat on her haunches poking his foot, but Liz had him tight in her arms so he wouldn't go sliding down the rest of their marble stairway.

"That was Black Star being stupid. But not_ this _stupid! What were you thinking?"

"I was thinking." He glared. "That you needed help."

Because she felt chilled blood drip through her fingers Liz ignored the comment and turned to Black Star with pleading eyes.

*.*

Well, if this wasn't the most pitiful, ridiculous situation he'd ever been in Kid didn't know what was.

Carried off like a damsel in distress because of a damsel in distress.

Though, he really should have known better. Not only did Liz have a flair for the dramatic she was also easily startled.

In consequence for his "stupidity" he spent the rest of the evening more or less nailed to bed, with Patty there entertaining herself on his feet.

Literally.

Getting up was now a matter of persuading Patty off his legs.

"Kid?" Decency was always lost of Patty, and as she crawled further up her Meister's lap, settled snuggled between his legs, tilted head propped on delicately painted neon fingers, he found that hadn't improved.

"Yes?" Kid never really knew what to expect from Patty, so he kept as calm and alert as possible.

Otherwise he'd be flipping a wig.

"What did you do to Liz-Siz?"

"….pardon?" She might have just knocked his composure out of the park.

"She's broken inside…" Whatever sadness Patti felt from her sister reflected in her own blue pools.

"Broken." A strong pain began brewing under his collarbone, so he paused a moment.

"There's tears that fall upwards."

"Are they falling now?"

For the first time Kid saw something almost "normal" in Patty's expression, the harsh yet careful way she seemed to threaten and beg at the same time. "Yes."

The Shinigami eyed his Weapon thoroughly before commanding her off him.

Patty knew she was suppose to stay and keep Kid from pulling the same stunt from that afternoon, but she also knew the only reason was so Liz could panic in silence.

She didn't like her sister to suffer alone.

So she obliged, rolled off his thin body to snuggle in the fluffy pillows, already back to laughing at the deranged game on her DS.

Kid knew he had to find Liz, set her "upside down tears" right side up—and hoped that it meant what he thought it did.

But walking proved just as difficult as it had that morning. He was weak from both the more or less liquid diet and the strain of recovery on his body, and the irritation that caused him wasn't helping either.

Ambling his way down the hall, Kid tried to locate Liz's soul, following the wisps of it around corners and through doors till he passed an open window by their side yard garden—found her draped casually over her white beach chair.

Was she crying?

He couldn't tell. She was beyond the light from their home.

Though Kid did feel an odd sense of serenity coming from her.

Climbing down the stairs and hobbling all the way around would be more painful and a greater waste of energy than it was worth, so he walked to the ledge, swung a leg over and jumped.

The thick thud of impact from his fall and the stifled hiss caught Liz's attention, and though she lazily searched for the source when she found it her eyes went wide and the entirety of her abdomen went crashing into her feet.

*.*.*

Oh poor Kid, falling off the second floor is painful even when you're not recovering a fatal accident. More later


	11. Change in a Moment

Great news everyone! I'm out of my artistic funk! I'm back to work, but now I have to really put in overtime to finish on-time, so this story might take a funny turn for the moment, but I'll come back to it when my editor says I can start doing fun things again!

*.*.*

Across the continents the sun shone brightly through the walls of an elegant and very old glass greenhouse. Dirt grimed the edges of its copper frame, but only served to enhance the grim beauty and mystique of the garden, long overrun by vines and leafs of plants with their own agendas and no restraint.

From the skylight roof hung enough wind chimes and gemstones to cast an army of colored dots across the Victorian style hideaway. Or they would have, had their true nature not been repressed by magic.

"So the twins were disposed of?" A hand sporting long fingers reached gracefully across the generous selection of crimson pillows for the jade quellazaire on the woven coffee table.

"Yes ma'am. But our contacts in China say they've detected motion from The Little One."

"Motion?" Her laugh would have had a calming effect on someone who didn't know better. "That's certainly an interesting choice of words. Such a delicious way to say 'we don't know much'."

The beautiful, thirty-something appearance of a Witch lit her cigarette on one of the many candles accompanying the roomful of assorted plants—one would think a dangerous combination.

"We'll let Kob handle that. For now…I believe it's almost time for a wedding."

She blew out the violet haze, shifted her gaze to a leaf pooled with water.

"You know how I love weddings…"

*.*.*

Tsubaki sat comfortably atop the cushions behind Black Star on the couch, half her attention on the evening news and half on the hair beneath her fingers and brush.

"I always escapes me why they would want to broadcast such terrible things."

"Well…" Her Technician leaned his head into her stomach, a leisurely grin spread across his face. "...it's what the people want."

"Says who?" Tsubaki scowled at the News Casters, silently shaming them for their part in the whole affair. "I certainly don't want to know about the nun who got killed by gang bangers."

"There were two nuns, and it was a drive by shooting."

The glare in her black eyes redirected to meet Black Star's, though the man didn't look the least bit worried, even seemed to invite more taunting as the hand on her calf moved to caress.

It wasn't until she took the brush to his bright, spiky hair that he started to squirm, and just as quickly resigned to letting her do whatever she wanted.

Ever since that first night so many months ago it was easier just to let her have her way—unless he wanted to wrestle over it, which was a different matter entirely.

"Well _I'll_ never get what's so fun about my hair."

She laughed, and god he loved that sound.

"For one thing your hair is soft—and don't make a face like that's bad—and for another it's a girl thing."

Black Star watched his partner silently, rested comfortably in her lap like a dog being groomed as he pondered away on that last little snipped.

He was about to unveil the playful argument when a knock on the door cut him off.

He felt Tsubaki go ridged, that telltale, singular twitch in her hands whenever something unexpected and off the plan happened.

"I'll get it."

But she was off the couch and around the corner before the offer hung more than a second off his tongue.

"That's ok, it's for me."

She could recognize that pompous, meddle-in-everything, atmosphere from further away than just her doorstep.

*.*.*

As her tall, stupid, handsome Meister staggered towards her Liz could only scold him angrily.

"Why?"

"Funny, that's usually pretty easy." He tried to joke through gritted teeth as he sank into Liz's outstretched arms.

Laughter was her response, the kind of dry halfhearted laugh that told him he was in trouble but that she was too tired to do anything about it. "You have to stop doing this."

She collapsed carefully into the cobblestone courtyard, still warm from the hot desert sun, and pressed a cheek into Kid's silken black hair. "You really…"

Liz didn't know what to do with him now.

Why did everything have to be so exhausting today?

She could call for Patty, but if Kid managed to escape her sister probably fell asleep on the job and wouldn't be easy to wake. She didn't even have her phone, so getting Maka or Tsubaki was pretty much out of the question.

And as she sat there in the moonlight, feeling more than a little foolish and helpless, Liz couldn't help but stop to consider that this was the third time she'd wound up being this close to her Meister in the past twenty-four hours—of his own doing. They hadn't touched so intimately so often in all the some odd years they'd been Technician and Weapon, and that had to count for something.

When she just seemed to melt and give up Kid knew Patty was right, that something was wrong.

He'd have to find out what, correct it, possible grovel.

But for the moment he found no motivation to do anything except lie in his backyard, held in the arms of his Weapon, and bask in the warmth that spurred through his body.

Funny how it seemed to spread from where her hands touched, from the side of his cheek pressed against her chest or even the whisper of her hair.

It reminded Kid of the tingling he'd felt after that manipulative kiss, how it lasted long after she'd hobbled, yes he saw that, out the door. And as his first thought was curiosity over whether the same phenomenon would happen again he found himself almost immediately swarmed with want.

Want to kiss more of her, explore and touch and feel that warmth inside himself last for hours.

And even though that was a simple idea it took a full minute for Kid to realize there was nothing wrong with it. Nothing at all.

Not without a bit of discomfort the Shinigami twisted in Liz's arms to look up at her in the moonlight.

Somehow all that blonde hair just glowed in it, serene, angelic, and the young death god wanted nothing more than to run his fingers through the golden locks that teased his face.

She looked lost, and he could feel the confliction rolling off her no matter how much she tried to hide it.

He wondered if she was swarmed with the same warmth and wants, and if so…perhaps this next move would set her back to right.

Liz didn't open her eyes even as the cold hand slipped against her cheek, as the man in her arms freed himself, kneeled over her lap, and pressed his lips to hers.

*.*.*.

"What's the news?" Tsubaki felt him behind her, the sturdy body of a man willing to support all her troubles. Almost.

"Nothing that concerns us." The warm smile on her face was a fake, but her words were true. Anything regarding her marital fate wasn't Black Star's problem.

Or so she'd silently promised.

With a wave—and an insulted glare for response—she sent the messenger back on his way. The Ninja Weapon didn't have time for pleasantries or hospitality right now, she was too busy trying to keep her world from falling apart.

This time with Black Star was meant to be fun, to capture the last rays of paradise in a bottle to shine for the rest of her life.

'If I can just have these two years…' She thought desperately as she purred out little convincing arguments when he pressed for more '…if I can be happy now, that's all I'll ever need.'

But Black Star wouldn't let it die.

"It's from your parents isn't it? That asshole Council? What do they want?"

His black eyes bore into her, searching for truth, for the hole in her story.

"Tsubaki…you know if it's causing you pain I'll find out one way or another. And I'm gunna do something about it."

The letter crumpled in her tight grasp, and the sincerity she saw in him compelled the woman to tell her troubles.

"They're trying to shorten my time."

She wasn't expecting how much the words would hurt when actually spoken aloud.

When the full weight of it hung in the air, stung, and brought the tears from the depth of her chest.

"They want to conduct a fertility examination, and if the results aren't what they expect…"

She didn't want to just stand there looking pitiful.

She didn't want him to feel obligated to "do something about it."

But all the sincerity transformed into fight, a want to fight for her, and while half of Tsubaki wanted him to storm the castle and whisk her away, the other half knew that wouldn't happen, not the way she wanted.

And boy did he want to whisk, to kick the shit out of her medieval minded family, sweep her up right there and then, march down to Death Hall and sign the marriage papers.

But all he could do was stand behind his cowardly reasoning and watch her suffer.

Getting married to him would be just as much the prison as this stupid breeding destiny was. She could be happy, yes, but never complete.

And wasn't that just the saddest little excuse?

"I'll be gone a few days I guess…but I'll make some food for you to re-heat so you won't just eat cereal." Tsubaki smiled kindly as she said this, though it was just as fake as the first.

Then she turned her head down, servile and apologetic to a degree beyond her usual stature, and the sadness in her came at him like bullets, and Black Star couldn't stand it.

"Fuck that. I'm going with you."

"…To Japan?"

"Sure. We've been meaning to go back, haven't we?"

Rather than reply Tsubaki offered a hurried, genuine smile, wrapped her arms around her blue haired companion's neck, and held on till sleep took her away from all waking problems.

*.*

Instinct had Liz mold into the contact, dissolve distance and ride the wonderful flutter that exploded from her heart.

And when the high was gone, when her brain actually started doing its job, Liz struggled with that instinct as deep-rooted logic told her to stop the nonsense.

Instinct and sensation won.

It was Kid who pulled away, hand still steady on her face as hers somehow came to tangle in his vest, and with large golden eyes hazed with his own bodily debates murmured.

"Does this ease your troubles?"

"Troubles?" Pain seared through the butterfly wings.

"You did that…to make me feel better?" Liz gulped back a bubble of air and the growing desire to scamper crab-style into the meticulously trimmed hedge behind her.

How could he? All the humiliating emotion she just unleashed on him and yet…

Because he felt her buck under his grasp Kid hooked his arm around her waist, moved his hand to the back of her neck.

"A perk, yes..."

Who taught him how to rub that one spot just so? Who? Damn them.

"…but I wanted to."

Liz wasn't exactly convinced, but whatever her Meister was doing to her neck might be too important to ignore.

So she indulged.

"Really…" It wasn't a question, if anything it was a challenge.

I dare you to prove my reality wrong. Go ahead, wake me up.

It just couldn't be this easy. After all the years of wishing and wanting, denying and starving herself of the feelings that seemed so wrong at the time, it only took was a few seconds to change it all?

Bullshit.

This was a dream, a wonderfully realist dream like the kind she was lucky enough to have every once in a happy moon.*

The hands on Kid's vest relaxed, one slipped up and the other down.

And if it was…

"Really."

Liz smirked into his confirmation, eased in for another taste of the dark man.

…she would make the most of it.

Kid sensed a shift in her, some odd form of strange acceptance mingled with the passion that seared against his lips—which surprised him, as the initial contact was smooth as ripples in the water. It was also interesting to discover that his body reacted to hers like it was cued to do so. When she pulled him forward his grip tightened to match, if she tilted her head to the left he would swoop in and start all over on the right, and as she opened he took.

They were well balanced, which really shouldn't have been such a surprise.

After all, for almost a decade they'd been matching the pace of each other's souls. Why should the body be much different?

But the desert chill was setting in, and Patty might start looking for them if they didn't show themselves soon.

Kid realized this, and finished the kiss with a taunting bite, felt proud and ridiculous male triumph when Liz tried to follow him as he moved back.

Still tangled in her arms, Kid lifted the woman off the cobblestones—stood strait though he might as well have been tipsy—and prepared to fight off her protests.

'If I didn't know any better…I'd think my dream was in pain.'

Liz blew a bit of ruffled blond hair out of her view, scrutinized the handsome face above her and decided that he was.

Of course he was, you'd be in pain too if you lifted yourself and another person with a four inch gap in your abdomen.

Which meant this wasn't some cranial fantasy, that what they just did was real, solid, and undoubtedly they would end up repeating it.

The thought turned her insides strange, she hadn't expected the flutter of happiness in her chest and the sink in her stomach.

Whatever that meant.

"Kid…"

Rather than yell—as he'd assumed she would—she practically breathed his name, and his eyebrows went up when he heard it, glanced down the almost pitifully large blue eyes and worried face.

A well-tended hand caressed his cheek so faintly that _Kid_ was beginning to worry.

"…Put me down this minute."

"You'll thank me in a minute."

He shifted her weight, freed his right hand, and from it came his favorite demon skateboard.

"Oh."

*.*

With Beelzebub it was just a short trip back through the window, down the hall and into Kid's room.

And although they were both expecting the bouncy blonde misfit, Patty wasn't anywhere to be found. Not in plain sight anyway.

Which made things a bit more awkward than they hoped as Liz helped Kid back into bed.

"There…um." As casually as possible she lifted the black shirt to peak at the bandages beneath—and found them freshly bloodied. "Damn it, you probably pulled a stitch…"

Kid's reaction was a kind of shrug and smirk—as if to say; "but it was worth it."

When the old bandages lay in a neat little pile in the trashcan and Liz finished wrapping the fresh set on the pair sat comfortably in their own silence.

Any embarrassment they felt had already drifted off sometime between Kid stripping and Liz shuffling clumsily through the first aid box, and all that was left was the calm atmosphere and quiet understanding that the time they spent together would never quite be the same.

It was odd, but Liz was sure she'd feel more excited than this. Maybe it just hadn't quite sunk in.

She wanted to test it, not with a kiss or some other dreamish fantasy but with something more solid.

The older woman wondered if she could ask him now about "fragment." Considered that whatever he answered might play sufficient in convincing her untrusting subconscious into believing reality.

After all, he wasn't in much of a position to clam up and stalk off, so what could it hurt?

And because she could almost see the three lines like stitches that once scared his face Liz absently traced the imaginary markings.

"Kid…what happened to you in Noah's book?"

The estranged gleam in his eyes told her he certainly wasn't expecting that.

"Well?"

Pale lids closed heavily as he crossed his arms and sank further into the gloomy pillows.

A beat or two went by and Liz scrunched her nose at him.

"I know you're not sleeping."

"When_ I_ know, you'll know." He bite in his voice rivaled her own, and Liz immediately regretted bringing it up.

Getting scolded by Kid was rare, but when he did—and when he wasn't talking about asymmetrical poses or eyebrows—he really, really meant it.

"It bothers you that much?"

The strangled chuckle must have been a scoff.

"That's one way to express it I suppose."

Liz wanted so much to understand what it meant to him, why it was so painful. She wanted to help him, ruffle the feathers and sooth hurt.

Instead, to satisfy both curiosity and itch Liz leaned in for a short, soft kiss that left Kid's head buzzing even in its simplicity.

There weren't quite enough brain cells still functioning to try and describe all that she felt as she left the Boy Wonder to his dreams and ponderings, slipped alluringly though the large doors to her own room where Patty waited for the news.

Happiness, she thought, this must be happiness in pure, untarnished form.

*.*

It would be another four years before Liz gave any real thought to Kid's fragment related insecurities, but at that time, she would have given anything not to know the answer.

*.*.*

sorry for the shorter chapter! The next one should be around soon.


	12. A new Nuance

One year later

Waking was a process, a slow transition between worlds, and Kid's began with unparalleled warmth. No longer than the measure of a those first aroma tingling breaths was the experience of blurred peachy light, all consuming warmth, and the telltale softness of both fine linens and his partner's body. Skin and cotton could feel the same, only to be humorously distinguishable a second later. The sheets were not truly warm. Below and above they held the heat of bodies, but if Kid spread his hand under the pillow he could feel the chilled cotton, still crisp from recent washing. Liz, in comparison, was constant, and a source. His other hand could stretch to limber stiffened muscles, then bring her tighter against his chest, and the softness, the heat of her body remained the same.

Another moment of slow focus reminds him that not all of her was completely cushiony though. Now more of his body becomes aware, and in pressing his Weapon closer he can feel the bones in her shoulder press almost uncomfortably against his chest, and rubs his cheek into the untidy mess of her hair to feel the temporary roughness of it.

In a few hours she'll brush it into submission, probably wash it too, and the hair that tickles his nose will be silky and smooth enough to film a commercial for the product she'd used.

There is sensation in his fingertips now, and he buries them in the lavish fabric of her nightwear.

From the slight damp and cool spot just below his collarbone Kid can enjoy a quick smile as she might have drooled a bit, meaning she'd slept so deeply she forgot to keep her appearance and manners in check.

A honed sense of smell washes him with the fresh discovery that someone's made breakfast downstairs. If he can just peak his ears a bit maybe he'll know who.

Senses restored almost ninety percent it was easy to catch the tiniest of Liz's initial stirrings. And as she turned her head away, whole body tightening into her first stretch Kid smiled like an idiot when he finally opens his eyes just to watch this display.

How had he ever woken up any other way? Twenty-one years without this routine—seven where she was just three doors away—seemed insane, unnatural even. And mornings like this Kid could barely remember what it was like all those times without her.

It still shocked him sometimes that of all the eligible—and formidable—opponents out there that could have stolen her hand he was the one who got to wake Liz with the gentle press of his lips against hers. And what a mystery his Weapon's response was.

Would she steal that first burst of air from him? Would mood and sleepy need prompt her to respond with hungry attack? Would a smile spread from his touch so he could pull back and see the radiant, blurry happiness in her eyes? Would she growl at the unwelcome wakeup call and push him back onto his half of the bed? Maybe something new today?

His second—more hopeful guess—was correct, and long fingers tangled in his uneven hair as the dull throb of his kiss ignited and spread like wildfire.

Within moments she was on top of him, and consciousness and surprise stirrings had thrown Liz headfirst into a liquid warm dreamy reality. But as a sharp taste eventually registered on her tongue the hazy horny morning spell disintegrated.

Liz broke away from her Meister, wiped her mouth and marched into the bathroom muttering something about morning breath.

There was still a slight blush on her cheeks as Kid sauntered in to witness her diligently and crankily scrubbed a foam cover for her mouth.

His cocky smirk could have melted her sudden attitude, but she'd been trying to teach him about "don't kiss me before ONE of us has brushed our teeth" for a few months now and since he was slow to learn this particular lesson Liz figured mild punishment was in order.

'So let him stand there in the doorway all he wants!' She thought. Not even the blood stirring way he poised that long, toned torso against Victorian surroundings could soften her resolve.

"You realize that shaking you from sleep is one of my few pleasures?"

Unable to speak due to a mouthful of mint Liz simply glared, then turned her eyes deliberately to her own appearance, tilting her head this way and that in the mirror to observe the damage.

His chuckle made her want to flick the paste at his face.

Probably wary of her thoughts, Kid crossed safely over her other side to grab his own toothbrush, using it to tap a new tube with a green label.

"Fluorite Gel, no nasty morning taste. If you'd used it last night like I suggested yesterday morning we'd still be in bed."

The confidence practically dripped off Kid's amused smile and golden eyes as he a sealed any further statements with mint toothpaste.

Liz refused to be embarrassed by this remark—how was she suppose to remember something he'd suggested before coffee?—and rather than indulge his ego quickly spat, rinsed, and turning on her heal to see if what smelled of eggs was edible.

Kid just shook his head and continued his routine.

Alone on the stairs now with only the noise of her feet and loud thoughts Liz Thompson felt rather foolish and…well, alone.

With a sigh she let her shoulders drop, felt the tension and annoyance drip away and was left empty.

All she had to do was look up at him with humble, slightly apologetic eyes and her Meister would have wrapped a long arm around her shoulders, brought her into his chest and placed one of those convened kisses upon her forehead.

Just the thought of that sensation gave her heart a little jolt, and her stomach melted into warm butterflies. So full of love and complete adore was that gesture. By far, it was her favorite.

Patty must have recognized the dreamy, wanting look in her older sister's eyes, because the smile the fluffy blonde pasted on her wide mouth seemed to light the entire room.

Clanking the wooden spoon against her frying pan Patty enthusiastically offered; "Toast 'n eggs?"

Liz couldn't help grabbing that fluffy head, rubbing her cheek against and squeezing her adorable sister tight. "Sounds delicious!"

"Try it with jelly today." Patty suggested, and Liz winced as she watched Patty spoon the sticky stuff into the eggs rather than the toast.

"…If you say so…"

Liz grabbed herself a cup of coffee, sprinkled it with chocolate powder and stirred in just the right amount of creamer. She drunk the first sip deep, enjoying the surge of energy and the sweet taste that would ward Kid off from trying to steal some of the drink from her cup.

Comfortably on her way to a fully charged cranium, Liz sat at the table and watched her other partner cook.

It was a recent phenomenon, Patty's obsession with learning to cook, and in just a few short months they'd already had five parties catered to the oddball's talents and tastes.  
The first would have made Charlie Brown proud, the second was a bit more successful—complete with meat and vegetables, the third even had dessert that was only dotted with jellybeans rather than covered in them. The fourth was an unforgettable barbeque, and their most recent endeavor had actually been a potluck.

Liz was just thankful their friends were so kind, so willing to put the fate of their dinners in Patty's hands and eat whatever she served gracefully.

Even more thankful were her feelings for Tsubaki—bless the woman—since she'd spent the most time coaxing out Patty's talents. The gentle Weapon would make such a good mother…

Liz sighed again before she could stop herself from thinking about her friend's sad predicament. If she could remember anything about her own family Liz was sure she had left for the similar oppressive reasons.

The tall woman didn't have too much time to linger on Tsubaki's troubles—or the plate of swirled purple eggs and crispy toast freshly served—when she heard Shinigami's call to come in for a job.

At 10am on a Saturday some people were not even close to being as awake as the residents of Death Mansion.

Tsubaki wasn't one of those people, but the man who slept fitfully in her lap was.

Her kind but heavy eyes turned occasionally from the ruffled blue head of her Meister to the cool morning, already transformed from blue to the dull Nevada yellow.

Truthfully she hadn't slept much that evening, caught barely a few hours between the sunrise at six—which had become her habit to watch-and waking again at half past nine.

This unusual pattern was now a habit Tsubaki hoped no one noticed. Even her partner didn't seem to reaize that he was always the first to fall asleep.

When she did sleep full nights it was only after very exhausting days, or particularly exhilarating nights, when the ache of her mind and body drowned the noise of troubles.

How much longer could this battle persist? How much longer could she defy her parents, hurting them, hurting her childhood friend and fiancée, and inevitably diminishing her own health.

It was stupid she knew, very stupid. She didn't owe the elders anything. Not one single thing, yet she'd warred with herself and with them, offered numerous compromises, and wasted more of her precious time with Black Star than they could ever compensate.

Leaning against the wide window of their new apartment—an address her family did not know—Tsubaki felt the wild wave of pride and lonesomeness boil freshly in her chest, always dangerous in the way it threatening to pool behind her eyes, bringing bitter tears rolling down her cheeks.

She desperately wanted this whole business of arranged marriages, bloodlines and duties to be done with.

But until the stubborn elders met her compromises the tall woman would have only her partner's comfort to ease the pain.

Tsubaki was gathering the energy to turn her head again, maybe run her fingers through Black Star's hair to wake him when she felt the man stir on his own.

His lips on her stomach tickled, and the rough hand that slipped under the large shirt she wore—his shirt—brushed delicately against her hip, spreading warmth from both whispering touches.

Heat and happiness eased her heavy mood like unwound muscles. Maybe it would be a good day.

The shrill ringing of the emergency line and Black Star's knee-jerk swearing suggested otherwise.

~*~*~

Twenty minutes later Kid, Liz, Patty, Black Star, Tsubaki, Maka, and Soul stood before the Reaper with an eclectic mix of expressions. The four who'd been well awake and ready to run seemed wound for action, but Black Star, Maka, and Soul all slouched, still recovering from the abrupt and unwelcome wake up call.

"A fifty minutes ago three witches snatched a four year old boy from an orphanage in Colorado." Shinigami-sama began to debrief them without waiting to call their attention.

"They were heading west by broomstick but they landed not long after takeoff. You should be able to catch them by flying."

The goofy masked Reaper turned to Maka. "Can you carry Black Star?"

Now at 100% attention Maka nodded a solemn yes. There was nothing like a kidnapped child to bring you out of a selfish mood.

Shinigami-sama paused briefly, his gaze now fixed on his own son. He had an itching feeling about the mission, the kind that lead a parent to think twice about sending their child into battle. "Maka and Black Star will be on offence. Kid, I want you to hang back as sniper support. One of these Witches is a telepath, and if she's strong enough to influence your teammates you'll need someone free. Understand?"

"Yes." Kid's golden eyes fixed on his father just as seriously as Maka, and every other Shibusen Representative in the room.

Five minutes later the team sped through the sky like bullets, Black Star easily balanced behind Maka, Tsubaki transformed into a light weapon sat calmly in one of the pockets on his vest.

Barely a word passed between the trio or their partners, they were too focused preparing themselves for all the possible outcomes of this excursion. Maka and Soul put in more effort than they had in months keeping their power steady and at the max as Maka searched the land before them for the Witches.

Down below the world blurred, Nevada desert eventually melted into the forests of Colorado, but the transition in color and environment was lost on the group.

"There!" Suddenly Maka caught the faintest grasp of their black souls, veering to the right to follow her sense.

The team lowered their speed and altitude, hoping to keep their presence hidden. Three miles along Kid saw the first glimpse of the kidnappers.

The young Princeling slowed to a quiet stop on a thick branched pine tree. Liz and Patty combined with a flash of blue and a small crazy giggle from the younger into a sniper riffle; their latest trick, and one of their greatest advantages.

Kid got a fix on them with the scope while Maka hovered next to him. Through their three-way Resonance he described their enemies and the state of their young goal.

_"Three confirmed. Witches. Boy is unconscious, held by the tall one."_

Maka closed her eyes and focused on their powers, the level of which she was sure they could topple in a manner of minutes.

These amateurs were nothing compared to Medusa.

"_Tall one is the telepath. Short and fat's got fire. Middle can make illusions?" _She relayed, a little uncertain about the Illusionist. Maybe she needed a second look.

"**Lets get ON with it!" **

Maka shot a quick look of disapproval at their hotheaded ninja but nodded to Kid and shot into the sky. They would take this from the top. This would be over swiftly, with no room for error.

"_Can you immobilize them? I'll grab the kid." _

Tsubaki transformed into a handful of throwing needles, and the blue haired warrior nodded in determined assurance.

"Alright then!"

Maka swung Soul a hard 90 degrees, and for less than a sharp breath they plummeted strait down to their target. With the extra force of gravity and speed Black Star jumped free of the Scythe, let leash his deadly Weapon.

The Telepath jerked to a stop, screeching a warning to her sisters as the ninja fell upon them.

'Maka…' Soul growled at his partner, hoping she would finally let up on her insane angle of descent.

The determination in her green eyes as she risked her own balance reaching a single hand out for the child silenced Soul. Desperate to protect his Meister he put a bit more of himself on the line as well as he played more dramatic notes on the piano of his heart.

Each second in the air drew them one dangerous measure closer to the ground, till Soul nearly screamed at her again to pull up—but Maka knew she only had once chance to grab the orphan before the real battle began.

Five feet from the ground the dull-blond woman snatched her sleeping target and kept straight, slowing just enough to swing back around to regroup with Kid.

Suddenly a tree she hadn't seen a moment before appeared in her path, and though some quick part of Maka's mind realize it was an illusion her body braced for the impact and veered sharp right. Her battle cry rang out as a real tree prompted her to abandon flight and try and save the child with a tuck and roll.

"Maka!" Soul released his Scythe form, wrapping his arms tight around his Meister and the child to brace their violent fall.

The trio hit the ground with hard a loud thud; raising dust, dirt, and pine needles as they somersaulted to a mildly safe stop.

Free of motion, the first thing Maka heard was the groan of her partner, which raised more concern than the pain in her shoulder, but not as much as the near panic she felt checking over the child in her arms.

"They must have drugged him…" She wondered, awed that he was not only unharmed but still unconscious.

Soul grunted as he pushed himself up on his elbows. "Or the kid's a heavy sleeper."

Maka shot a scrutinizing, then very apologetic glance at her dusty man. "Sorry…we had more momentum than I thought…"

Soul scratched at the pine needles in his white hair. "Don't worry about that now, I think blue boy needs backup."

Maka nodded as she set the child on the forest floor, struggled to stand, and offered her Weapon her hand.

Without another word he transformed back into a Weapon, and the two merged their heart and power—Resonance—the kind that shook the earth around them and drew weary looks from their enemies.

"Black Star!"

Their old friend knew what they wanted without so much as a glance in their direction. He leapt to the side seconds before Witch Hunter sliced through two of the intended targets.

Their screams as the purple flames burned their evil flesh was a noise all three teams were use to hearing. The Fire wielder and Illusionist died without so much as a bat of any watching eyes.

Only the Telepath remained, injured by the bite of Tsubaki's blades. Her teeth ground in irritation, but she raised her hands slowly in surrender.

Black Star took the opportunity to quickly knock her unconscious.

"Sorry lady, can't chance you messin' with our heads."

A high afternoon sun settled strange shadows on the scene as the trio of Meisters and Weapons figured out how to best transport their new cargo.

They ended up waiting for a ride, and in the hour it took the Shibusen helicopter to find them the young boy had woken.

At first he was wary of the seven new faces, but Tsubaki's soothing words settled him down enough to ask in toddler's English where he was.

Black Star, Kid, and Soul watched from a slight distance after that while the women fawned over their new keepsake.

It was no surprise he took most quickly to Tsubaki, clinging to her as he sat in her lap with the other women crowded around to watch—practically mesmerized.

The four year old was small for his age, with wild, strait black hair and piercing eyes. He was Asian, and the fact that his earliest years were spent in rural China was probably a tribute to his small features.

"What's your name?" Patty seemed to be able to communicate best with the boy—best understand his verbal gibberish anyway.

"Kubi." He muttered, not making eye contact with the bubbly woman.

The adults exchanged humorous looks and stifled their laughter. They already knew his name as Tobi from the mission intel.

"Cool! Like a fox! Do you like foxes?" Patty's friendliness seemed to have the opposite effect she intended, as Tobi hid his head in Tsubaki's chest.

Tsubaki's cool voice soothed his nearly invisible shivers "Patty, I think you might be a little too loud for Tobi."

"KUbi." His eyes looked up at her in the most desperate and determined way, nearly threatening tears. That faced caught Tsubaki off guard, shaking her out of the peaceful state she tried to force herself into around others.

There was something about this boy—something that made her feel as though she were being sucked down a tunnel—like she could see right through him to all the hurt that lay below.

How many people had called him again and again by a name that wasn't his own?

This unendingly sad realization would have brought the stinging tears to her eyes if Tsubaki didn't have better control. "Kubi." She confirmed with a shaking smile that eventually blossomed into one of pure warmth and sincerity.

The other women exchanged careful glances, making silent promises to try and be more "Tsubaki-like" the next time they spoke to the toddler.

A few feet away Black Star sat with one foot on the bound Witch, his chin propped on his palm aimed nonchalantly at his partner.

Though there was nothing casual about his gaze.

The woman and child he saw could easily have been family—a delicate mother and timid child. This image caused a strange mix of intense pain and wonderfully warm pride.

"Nice picture isn't it?" Soul smirked down at his best friend, that horrible jazzy smirk that could get on Black Star's nerves just as quickly as it could spread to his own lips.

"YUP! Nothing like breeding to send the women into a frenzy. Same thing happens with puppies. 'Got no fuckin' clue why."

Kid would have answered with something technical but the thunder of helicopter wings cut him off quickly.

When the crew got out at Shibusen Academy Kubi still clung to Tsubaki, and she seemed all too happy to carry him as they walked to the thrown of Death.

Many things had to be decided in the next few hours. Why did the witches want Kubi? Would they keep him under surveillance at Shibusen? Who were the magic troublemakers working for?

Maka and Kid reported on the night's events with nearly perfected accuracy while their leader listened, his wise eyes fixed on both the Witch and the young child.

When the reports concluded he cleared his throat, and stated; "I think it's best if we do keep him—for now. Stein will interrogate the Witch—Maka, you and Soul shall assist to keep any mental interference from influencing the Doctor." He seemed to ponder his next question carefully.

"As for what to do with the little fella…"

"Um-Sir!" Tsubaki stepped forward, carefully setting Kubi down for the first time since she'd picked him up in the forest. "I'd like him to stay with me…Please."

The little fist pulling at her dress firmed her resolve.

Shinigami smiled—though non could see. "Certainly."

A diamond smile transformed the quiet woman's entire face, and as Black Star watched Tsubaki offer her hand to the child he thought he'd never seen her look so beautiful.

Liz chuckled as Kubi snatched the long fingers greedily into his own, wishing just a little that it could be her hand holding such a small existence.

Though one look at Kid reminded her: 1. She hated kids. 2. She wasn't nearly finished enjoying her time with her partner. 3. Weren't they thinking about getting a puppy? One nuisance at a time.

More than a thousand miles away the greenhouse witch bit her carefully tended nails in frustration. "Damn it!"

Every candle around her flickered red as she pondered whether to give up her secrecy to send her old acquaintance Shinigami a message or wait for him to realize what a possibly grave mistake he'd just made by allowing the boy to stay in Death City.

To be continued!

**One year later (oh god literally too)**

**Hey everybody! Author's note time. **

**I'm really sorry it took me so long to get back to this story. Long excuse short I took a LOT of classes this semester and literally had no time for anything. Ask my boyfriend. He got so lonely. **

**Anyway I hope you enjoyed this last chapter and feel that my style hasn't changed too much since last summer. **

**To answer a few of your questions I AM up to date with the Soul Eater manga, but in my story Liz and Patty got to see Kid inside Noah's book but still have no idea what happened to him. This story was also spun long before the bit about Kid + Madness = new power so that won't be in this story either.**

**I'd like to say that another chapter will be out by the end of the week but you can either expect it sooner or later than that depending on how much of the plot I start to unravel as I go forward tomorrow.**

**Lots of love to you all! You can now catch me on Tumblr: **

**And Deviantart: **


	13. Dreams of a dreamer

Thanks so much for your kind reviews so far!

Before I finish the next chapter I'll be going back over the past 11 chapters and rechecking them for errors. I'm not the world's most patient re-reader but it's easier if I'm not so anxious to prattle off the next bit lol Anyway, I'm re-reading your reviews too b/c one of the cool things you guys do is give me constructive criticism. So if you've got any particularly issues and didn't mention them before now it was great time! You could do it by chapter or in one big review—just make sure to mark your chapters or specify if it's an error that goes through the whole story!

Thanks a lot you guys, hope you enjoy this new addition.

To say that Black Star was a bit uncomfortable with the scene unfolding in his home would be an understatement. Suddenly there were worries of hiding sharp weapons, bottles of toxic or intoxicating substances, and the sharp corners their three-bedroom apartment seemed to be riddle with.

The twenty two year old watched his life long partner scramble as gracefully as he imaged anyone could with an armful of magazines, unfinished laundry, and breakfast dishes. All the while with a warm smile—much too excited to be truly apologetic—plastered on her face.

"We're really usually not this messy." She explained as Kubi watched her, perplexed and quickly tickled with amusement. "Honestly…it was such a rushed morning."

"Is' alright, the orpige is messy all the time."

Tsubaki's heart broke just a little thinking of the sweet boy living in an orphanage, especially since it seemed he'd lived most of his short life there. He would have a very comfortable, happy stay in her home, she promised herself as she got out the new toys they bought on the way.

When Tsubaki spared a glance at Black Star she noticed with a little surprise how awkward he seemed, and took to occasionally sending a comforting glance his way, or brushing a casual hand down her Meister's arm. Both small gestures soothed nicely until she could talk about it later.

It wasn't until a good half hour later when Kubi sat at their low table coloring his way through the bran new book and crayons that Tsubaki finally had time to pull Black Star aside.

The first thing she got was a long, warm kiss that weakened her knees and had her arms wrapped around her Meister's muscled shoulders.

When he drew away Tsubaki found herself scrambling for the words she wanted to say before his little interruption. Lightly flushed she took the time to collect her thoughts before continuing—black eyes fixed on those of her Meister. "I should apologize—it was inconsiderate not to ask you first if I could bring him home…"

A half foolish half devilish grin chased away Tsubaki's insecurities. "And how do you think I woulda' been able to say no?"

Really, how could he have even begun to ponder the possibility of not giving the woman in his arms exactly what she wanted when the request was so small, so simple.

She might have convinced herself that he'd forgotten the deadline hovering above their heads but Black Star was well aware. He knew that their two years of happiness and freedom was about to collide with a crossroads that could make or break their entire world.

Tsubaki would either marry him, or some stranger halfway across the globe. Some stranger with "good breeding," delicate manners, and supposedly excellent skill in Aikido.

There was a time he had almost convinced himself that this was an agreeable ending, that Tsubaki would be infinitely more happy with Hiruki, and that he himself could never amount to all that was expected of a good father and good husband. But that idle, childish fantasy was the product of wishful thinking from less than two years ago, and two years felt like both an eternity and a fleeting breath of time. What seemed impossible then, even painful to contemplate, could pass him as casually as an admiring glance from a stranger on the street.

Watching Tsubaki encourage Kubi to eat his vegetables Black Star wondered if this situation was more than just a little lucky. Maybe, just maybe, if they could survive this little stray…if he could find the confidence and audacity to assume they could repeat the process all over again in a few more years…this time with their own family…maybe this two year paradise didn't have to end.

The Witch didn't bother struggling against the bonds around her hands or legs. Rather than flail and offer pleas of helplessness she sat cool and calculating. Only a first year student would see this supposed complacency as a positive sign.

The interrogation room was small, cramped on purpose to evoke feelings of claustrophobia and the grave. There was no distinguishing the stonewalls from the ceiling, and eery candlelight provided a low, flickering visibility. At any minute those candles could extinguish, leaving them all in total darkness.

That as the appearance anyway, really it was just one elaborate scare house.

Maka watched her mentor, now colleague, study the green haired Witch from a distance. Was he deciding how best to break that calm spirit or fantasizing about dissecting her brain?

With a practically silent sigh Maka smiled fondly at the grey haired man and decided it best to interrupt his thoughts. "Soul and I can keep any communication she might try and make with you to a safe minimum. Would you like to get started?"

The professor nodded slowly, perhaps only half his incredible mind on Maka's offer. "Yes. Let's." He pushed the glasses up on his nose for an overall comical effect, and Soul lifted a brow when he thought he saw the man ruffle his already wrinkled lab coat.

'Man's got his own style, can't deny that.'

"Soul." Maka closed her eyes, placed a hand on her partner's shoulder, and the two of them dissolved into his piano room.

Whatever raw talent she had at dispelling madness amplified tenfold.

Stein breathed deeply of this welcome relief, indulging perhaps the only true quiet he ever got from the voices still lingering in his head. He didn't want to feel giddy about the syringe of truth serum in his coat pocket, or the prospect using whatever means necessary to squeeze out the information they needed. Madness was supposed to be far behind him.

Still, this was pure business. Necessary to the safety of his students—possibly even the world! So the grey haired doctor let a twisted smile creep over his lips, and in his most intimidatingly insane voice asked "Are we doing this the fun way or me, or the safe way for you?"

The witch squinted her eyes slightly in growing distain. "You fools don't even realize what you've brought into your precious town do you?"

Stein tilted his head a shocking angle "Oooh? Really. Are you the most powerful Telepath on the planet? I doubt that." Maka and Soul were either doing a perfect job, or the woman tied before him wasn't trying at all to send out any subliminal messages.

The calm chuckle sent up a small warning flag, like she was the one in control instead of him. "Honestly I'm surprised the "great" Shinigami hasn't figured it out. He must be loosing his touch."

Stein spun the old school syringe on his middle finger. "Guess it's the fun way."

Faster than lightening those sultry eyes shot wide open, and her pupils spread, nearly engulfing all the white of her eyes. Some unseen pressure shook the room, knocking debris free from ceiling and threatening the flames of the candles on every wall. 

Her voice rumbled in Stein's mind so loudly he didn't hear Maka call out to him.

"**That child will bring nothing but devastation to Shibusen. You would be wise to release him to us. Your arrogance and ignorance will be your undoing!"**

If the Witches powers were an earthquake then Maka's was a wash of cool spring water.

Just as quickly as it had been disrupted the room became still once again, but the Witch's words, and the mad sincerity of her eyes echoed in Stein's memory.

After a small beat; "Who are you working for?" Stein resumed as though there had never been a break in his routine.

In the end Kubi left only the snow peas on his plate, but seemed genuinely happy about his new surroundings. Black Star noted that some color had come into the toddler's cheeks, and though it was small, a smile played nicely with the boy's drooping eyes.

Kubi must have caught the harmless but chiding look on Tsubaki's face as she cleared the dishes away, because comfortable sleepiness quickly blended with embarrassment.

Black Star watched the boy squirm a bit, and in a reckless effort to make the little fella more comfortable he leaned in close and whispered; "I never liked the green stuff either."

For the first time since Kubi looked up at someone who wasn't Tsubaki, and when his eyes met the older man's something akin to total adoration shone through.

This gave Black Star quite the shock, though he tried not to show it. Instead, held that contact firm, smiled confidently and eased into another question.

By the time Tsubaki finished washing up the two were locked deep in something wonderful and secretive. It brought a distinct thrill to her heart.

Quietly she came over to sit with them, watched mesmerized as Kubi rattled on about some game of make believe in a language that sometimes went right over her head but Black Star didn't loose a beat. Whatever was happening between them could not have been explained by logic or reason. There was no room or need for jealousy that it was her Partner the boy ended up imprinting on so well to. Rather, that knowledge spread through her chest, warming and disrupting all her nerves so completely it must have shown in her face.

Black Star shot a fast glance at her, never loosing pace with Kubi's story, but in that momentary look his eyes said everything perfectly.

"that's when the teakur usually comes an we havta go inside." The dark haired boy drew a long breath to compensate for what he'd spent in the last ten minutes, then cast his eyes to the ground once in anticipation before beaming his reserved smile up at the ninja—hoping desperately for approval.

"Sounds awesome. We should try it tomorrow…with balloons."

The simple suggestion made wide eyes even larger, and the deep laughter that rang through the apartment was more natural than the scent of fresh apple pie on a chilly fall afternoon.

Tsubaki did her best to segue into the subject of bedtime. "First thing in the morning lets go buy some."

The small cry of "Really?" she expected came right on time, and she nodded skillfully. "First we have to go to sleep though."

The strange urge Black Star felt to pluck the child from the sitting pillow and carry him over his shoulder into the bathroom went unfulfilled, but when Kubi reached out for his arm the two went hand in hand to brush their teeth while Tsubaki rounded up something for Kubi to sleep in.

It wasn't until she found herself alone, shifting through a drawer of her old cloths that the master Weapon found the throbbing in her chest had turned gradually from warm to painful. 'This won't do…' She chided herself as she felt the heaviness behind her eyes that usually meant tears. Laughing at herself Tsubaki continued to pick up long forgotten shirts and gauge their size, but as her hands started to tremble, and her vision blurred she resigned herself to the small storm of selfish, childish behavior. 

Her knees buckled, and sapped of all her strength Tsubaki slid to the floor like a feather in the wind, the green shirt in her hands pressed into her face and grasped firmly in her fists as she sobbed silently. Wept bitterly over the possibilities that were so close she could see them—touch them—yet so far.

Horribly far it was too cruel.

The next morning Shinigami-sama sat in his almost overly cheery room eyeing Maka's tidy report. The standard "who are you" "what's your plan" dialogue felt too mundane to read but he did so anyway, soaking in the new information, looking for anything that peaked his interest.

The first three hours appeared uneventful as it seemed the Witch knew little more about the boy than they did, except that her Mistress wanted him.

"_I don't know what she wants with the brat. Sacrifice him, raise him, I don't care. She told us to get him and we did." _

It was the third paragraph that lit up like lights on a Christmas tree. Everything before that, the description of the woman's personality, her use of words, even the calm yet spiteful glare in her eye changed. As if she became a completely different person.

"_That's enough of this wasteful banter. I'd like to see Shinigami. He'll have the brains to know what we're trying to do."_

From that point on she barely gave Stein so much as a sideways glance, merely asked for the Lord of Death himself, providing no hint of an explanation as to why.

Maka noted that there was no visible change to her soul. If something, or someone, was suddenly speaking through her it was not with possession. Though, the Witch _was _a Telepath—a powerful one by the sound of it—so perhaps her Mistress had come for a welcome visit.

Shinigami finished the report with a sigh of discontent, tossing it aimlessly to the side. He closed his eyes and thought for a moment of all the facts so far.

It would be reasonable to suspect a Witch related terror act soon, though perhaps a little premature. Fact was, they still didn't know a thing about who sent the three kidnappers, who the unnamed organizer was, or what they wanted with a four year old immigrant whose adopted parents tied tragically two years ago. They claimed the child was dangerous, but he'd seem the boy for himself, felt his presence and potential and could find no ill will present in the child's soul. As far as he knew Kubi wasn't a Weapon or a Meister, and he didn't fit the profile of a Witch or Werewolf.

One thing was for certain; whatever the Witches wanted with this obviously helpless four year old could not be good. Bodily or mentally, Shinigami refused to risk allowing them to intervene in what could be a perfectly normal life.

The question remained…how long would they be able to keep the child in protective custody? What would he do if such an act sparked war with an unknown coven? And the possibility he refused to ponder yet continued to plague him…what if the boy did, overtime, evolve into powers as deadly as the Witches suggest?

Black Star was a notoriously deep sleeper. When everything was well, and harmless, that is. As a ninja, when he felt the eyes or heard the sounds of an approaching attack he could be awake and focused in under five seconds.

'Watched' was the feeling that woke him at ten thirty-four, on a Sunday no less.

While the instinct had been partially correct, the young man couldn't keep the smile off his lips when he realized that it was not some deadly attacker but two, huge, green eyes of an anxious little boy.

Kubi hadn't forgotten the joint promise of early morning play, so he ambitiously snuck into the bedroom where to his absolute dismay he found Black Star and Tsubaki still sleeping. For almost five minutes he'd observed the way the pair lay so relaxed, so happy, their shoulders brushed as they lay on their backs, left and right hands clasped loosely over the light sheet.

His first thought after forgiving them their forgotten promise was to wonder what it might be like to lay between them, surrounded, protected, loved.

It was that silent longing that Black Star saw in the boy's eyes when his own shot open—and it was a look recognized all too well from his own parentless past.

He didn't need long to think about it. Though he fully realized all it might imply Black Star gave Kubi the silent nod of invitation as he moved on the futon to make room for the boy.

It took a bit of coaxing, but just a little. Curiosity and a child's deepest wishes won over Kubi's reluctance quickly.

Kubi crept as quietly, as softly as he could manage over Black Star to snuggle into the triangle between the man's arm and torso. It took a moment and a bit of squirming to make the hardened muscles and thick shoulder accommodating, but when everyone was settled again, giggles sufficient surprised, Black star lifted his hand off Tsubaki's. Kubi slipped his own into the big, warm palm of the oblivious woman.

Every inch of the boy's body tingled, his smile was a struggle between utter joy and embarrassment, and kept fidgeting between wide and puckered. When Black Star's even larger hand—rough, strong, but warm came down to complete the pile a shock of giddy electricity danced over Kubi's skin.

Black Star settled back down into his pillow, watched the flip-flop reactions out of the corner of his eye and refused to let himself think deep or depressing thoughts.

Something unfamiliar was growing in his chest, something akin to what he'd felt the first time he and Tsubaki kissed but deeper, more contained, more like a ball of dread hiding a burning fire inside. To settle this sensation he kept his eyes on the boy

At eleven fifty the smallest movement stirred Tsubaki from much needed rest.

The dream which felt so real and compelling only seconds before slipped through her consciousness like the fog that disappeared with the rising sun.

It took her a while to grasp for control of her still body, and when she did Tsubaki wondered if she might _still_ be dreaming. She wasn't expecting to feel a tiny hand in her own, or see the equally tiny body cradled against Black Star as easily if this were a well-established routine.

The man and child seemed to be snoring in unison.

A smile sparked across her face as she turned on her side, brushed her right hand through Kubi's messy hair. The ninja weapon lay there, unaware of how long, petting that tiny head. She didn't realize the tears flowing steady down her cheeks until Black Star broke from his own dream and looked at her with such absurd concern—reached out his hand to skim the side of his finger over the falling droplets.

His movement woke Kubi, and though the boy wasn't as fast to shake the haze from his eyes he noticed Tsubaki's mood quickly and to both adult's surprise scurried under the covers.

Laughing even as the unwanted tears continued to fall Tsubaki lifted the sheets like a tent and tried to explain herself: These weren't tears of upset or anger, she was happy.

It wasn't true, but it wasn't a lie either.

Sufficiently assured he wasn't the cause of Tsubaki's fit Kubi crawled out from the sheets, reminding Black Star of a fawn they'd watched in the forest once. Then, to the man's amazement Kubi sat up on his knees and tried to wipe the weeping from Tsubaki's cheeks.

She tried so desperately not to let that innocent gesture bring down more of this horribly childish display but she smiled weakly and couldn't help it.

How many nights had she dreamed of waking just this way? The two loves of her life in her bed, or in the bath, in the kitchen or on the sofa. Someday a backyard, Kid's pool, Shibusen Academy and the first day of classes.

All those needs and dreams vibrated and shook within her so real and so alive that she had no choice but to let them overwhelm her.

Black Star pulled his partner into his lap, held her, rocked her, and for every ounce of happiness and longing she felt his heart ripped with the force of his guilt.

Kubi just sat by, one hand continually on the strange woman's leg, the other petting her hair.

For the first time in his entire life he saw an adult who needed something only he could give. Amazed, he watched Tsubaki's moment of weakness, and perhaps in that moment fell in love with her.

It was well past lunch when the Trio of teams returned to Shibusen Academy for Shinigami's debriefing.

Kubi waited in the hallway with Marie, they were completely free to discuss the boy's uncertain future without worrying about his feelings.

For now.

"From the information we've gathered, it's pretty obvious we need to keep this little guy here in our walls…Kid—you Liz and Patty will go and try and track down this Mistress. Maka, you and Soul will stay to continue assisting Stein." The towering collection of oddly shaped black turned delicately towards Tsubaki and Black Star.

In all his years he was sure there hadn't been a pair who'd given him so much personal grief.

"We can't say for certain how long Kubi will have to stay with us. As for when or even if any dangerous powers might develop I can't think of anyone else I'd rather have watching him. Would you two mind watching over the boy a few more days?"

Seeing Tsubaki light up was all the Lord of Death needed.

"Excellent! Settle then. Everyone, to your duties."

A flashy hand gesture dismissed the seven adults, though they lingered just a while talking amongst themselves.

Maka and Liz wanted to know how Kubi spent his first night, did he eat well, had he slept alright. Tsubaki filled them in with generous detail, even offered to let them in on babysitting duty. Liz made a face she only employed as a way of describing Brussels Sprouts, and Maka claimed she wouldn't know what to do with something she couldn't assign homework to.

Kid tried his best not to seem interested in their conversation though he hung around well within earshot while Black Star pulled Soul to the side.

"Ok man, I got somethin' to ask but you laugh I'll kick you in the nuts."

"How about convulsive giggling?"

A death glare from a highly trained ninja shouldn't have seemed so intimidating—or desperate.

After a small pause Soul leaned towards his life long friend as a sign of peace. "Alright. What's got you?"

Black Star stood rock ridged as the words tumbled out of his numb mouth. "Soo...?"

Soul froze, then blinked rapidly. An eastern wind boasting one lone tumbleweed might as well have blown between them as the white haired man tried his best to think of an answer that didn't involve tackling his friend to the ground and demanding a more precise—and clear—repeat of that statement.

Black Star tried not to fidget, but Soul's reaction was about to drive him insane. Luckily for the both of them Soul finally replied: 

"Well how the hell should **I **know?"

to be continued


	14. Through my fingers

Wow those earlier chapters really need some work!

I've also been enjoying myself by going through Gin-Kyo's gallery on Deviantart (she does wonderful fanart for this story!) and reading the comments on the picture she did for chapter 10. lol! So for the fans who wanted more Kid/Liz I hear you. This re-writing of of chp 14 is for you. You know who you are lol.

Anyway, I hope you guys love this chapter just as much as I do!

….

14.

"Well how the hell should **I **know?" Soul hissed under his breath.

"Because, dumbass, you _did_!"

Black Star's outburst drew the eyes of the women—and Kid—leaving Soul to wave apologetically at them before dragging his loud mouth friend outside.

"Damn it I didn't _really_ ask her! It's not…official…exactly…" Soul's voice trailed off as he thought back. Had it really been two years already?

"I just told her what I wanted—what I thought she wanted—except it was a question." He looked up at the ninja with a slightly pained expression. "Get it?"

Black Star took a moment to process what Soul offered. His brain whirled with all the possibilities, somehow always ending up on those ridiculous romantic movies Tsubaki and the girls insisted were enjoyable to watch.

He shook his head as though the motion would wipe the slate clean and allow for some peace. One thing was pretty certain: he would need a ring.

Pivoting on his heal towards the humble town, Black Star scoped out the nearest jeweler and hoped his confidence would last until the shopping and planning was over.

"I'll get her somethin' simple. She can pick out a fancy one she actually likes when she says yes."

Soul scoffed and kicked the ground, sulking in his own miseries and shortcomings. "Like you can afford diamonds."

Black Star just grinned and grabbed his old friend's wrist, pulling him along at speeds Soul could never hope to keep up for long.

… 

"I wonder what they're up to…" Liz eyed the pair of delinquents critically as they scampered off.

Maka sighed heavily "No good…" She figured Soul wasn't the mastermind behind the escape but suspected it was probably his suggestion that got Black Star so worked up.

Tsubaki just shook her head. "I hope he remembers the groceries."

"And the balloons!" Kubi still hadn't forgotten, and was trying his best to fit into the adult's conversation.

"Exactly." Tsubaki beamed at the little boy as Liz, Patty, and Maka discussed what they would do before heading out to track down the coven.

Kid tried very hard to stifle the angry fire in his eyes and the feeling of abandonment lodged in his throat as he joined the girls on their leisurely walk home. What was he? Another housewife?

Liz made him stop grumbling to himself a few minutes later. "You're scaring the kid Kid!"

Maka tried her best not to laugh even if Patty didn't.

"Oh, he's just upset he didn't get to go with the boys." Tsubaki explained casually.

"I am no such thing." Kid protested, straitening his posture as he collected pieces of shattered pride.

"Don' worry…" Kubi looked up at the dark prince and in all seriousness said: "They didn't take me either."

A loud collection of cool female laughter decorated the streets of Death City as the group continued towards Kid's mansion.

Althear stood inside her greenhouse, watching the rain try with limited success to wash the windows clean.

She _liked _the ancient, well worn feeling her home provoked, the way her little houseplants had long overrun the place—evolving into trees or bushes that sucked up more space than they should.

Plants hung from every ceiling panel, nestled in every corner, twisting around her wind chimes, furniture, and other decadent little decorations. Her favorite chair sat in front of an oak that nearly swallowed the grand Victorian style parlor chair.

Aside from the eastern wall that connected with the rest of a castle she barley used every surface boasted glass windows, a thick iron frame, and apparently messy decoration. Stain glass specked here and there where a window broke and needed replacing. Each new addition would some day tell an epic story. Though it would take a very long wait to do it that way, and Althear had more than enough time for waiting.

Tonight, thunder and lightening threatened to break every last remaining piece, but the Witch didn't care.

Her mind was thousands of miles away, thinking only of Shibusen and the toddler her associates failed miserably to bring her. 

How much longer until Shinigami realized his grave error? The scenes she watched that day in the leaf pools made her rethink how easy it would be to get those soul hunters to give up the child. The lonely woman and her ninja became attached so quickly it almost seemed unnatural, though the happiness she saw was true.

Althear thought of her own son, of his current happiness, and for a moment in the moody rain indulged her emotions. Which would be kinder? To rip the boy from their arms now before they became too attached, or allow the creature a small measure of happiness.

She blew a cloud of purple smoke through delicately painted lips, tapped her quellazire against the crumbling bricks and lit another cigarette.

Mommy feelings could be such a pain in the ass…

When Black Star finally slipped back into his apartment he nearly thanked the gods Tsubaki wasn't home.

The little box in his back pocket burned as though it could feel the excitement its new owner, but anxious as he was it was only three in the afternoon, and Kubi probably wouldn't be put to bed until nine or even ten.

'Will I be able to wait that damn long?' He dragged a hand through his hair and blew a frustrated breath out in a huff.

If he wasn't careful logic might come to frighten this spontaneous idea away: weren't they a little young? No! Well, yes. But Tsubaki wasn't. Did he get to count all the years they were just Meister and Weapon, or had they only been "together" for two years? What if her parents didn't approve of him? What if the council hot heads said no?

Taking in a deep breath Black Star took a metaphorical fist to the growing pile of "what ifs" that didn't sit well with him. 'Just focus on the facts.' He told himself.

Fact number one: Tsubaki needed to get married more or less to-freaking-morrow.  
Fact number two: if that morning taught Black Star anything it was that he would never be able to give her to someone else. For every tear she cried he would give her a year of happiness. He had to. He had to do something about the guilt threatening to blow his heart apart.

'It definitely wasn't **all** about the guilt.' He thought defensively against an invisible critic. The image of her happy face spread through him like whisky, warming his body from toe tips to ear tops.

Fact number three: He knew with absolute certainty that he wanted to see that smile every day of his life.

He had the ring, the words, the…_ahem,_ resolve. All he had to do was wait however many ungodly hours it took until they could be alone.

In the meantime Black Star figured it best to exercise—a few hundred of everything should do—and shower. Soul's biggest claim to advice was that no woman wants to spend the rest of her life with a man who smells like a Dojo.

He didn't really believe it, but he wasn't taking any chances.

Liz, Kid, and Patty stood at the doorstep, watching their friends disappear down the street. Patty waved her whole arm, all the while smiling like a nut case, but her sister didn't care. They had all deserved the quiet afternoon of tea, cakes, and children's games.

"It's been too long since we were all together." Liz admitted on an exhale.

Kid nodded quietly, not so much agreeing with her as being complacent. 'Tea party indeed.' He thought with sarcastic nonchalance.

Prickly as his mood was, when Patty ran upstairs to pack he didn't resist the urge to draw Liz into his chest, brush his lips against her temple, and relax there a moment.

Liz smiled wide and wrapped her arms around the wiry man. "I'm sorry Soul and Black Star left you behind." The chill of his body and silky shirt felt good against her cheek in the hot afternoon sun, thought it was the closeness Liz found most delightful.

Her Meister shrugged, but the older woman knew the slight offence would worry him until he could give both boys a good chewing through. Kid was usually so aloof about these kinds of things, never too excited about parties, guy's night out, or perceptions of "manliness." It's what made him the dark, eluding character that stirred her blood and perked her imagination. Kid was who he was, and didn't care that he tended to be a bit more sophisticated than their group of friends was use to. Though…lately Liz noticed something of frustration brewing in her partner's behavior.

Frustration was always an interesting mood on Kid. His eyebrows drew down at the most enticing angle, darkening his eyes and turning what could be a very peaceful face serious and threatening if you found yourself under that glare. Whenever he got any kind of moody those eyes turned to study the floor, and the tilt of his head made the tips of his hair sweep mysteriously across his face. His cloths also took a turn for the more dramatic, but only if there was a mission to dress up for. Ragged ended jackets and black hoods were still a favorite.

Yes, Liz knew all these signs well. But because Kid rarely let her into his head Liz could only guess as to the cause.

Her warm smile turned wicked as she dragged her fingers down his back, purposefully trying to spark desire in hopes of brightening his disposition. "Real men play tea party." The nip to his bottom lip sealed the spell. Kid no longer looked the least bit dejected, distracted, or pitiful.

Liz watched in pure amusement as his pupils went wide, all the lean muscles in his body became tight and his posture ridged.

Her actions were only playful, but the lazy gaze of her eyes under thick lashes and the seductive press of her body against his might as well have been a declaration of war.

Just when she was beginning to wonder if all he was going to do was stare at her his eyes glazed over, and he murmured "Indeed."

The arm that held Liz lifted her in a quick upward jerk, and the hard kiss that met her lips shocked Liz even as she melted into it. Kid has always been so gentle, careful, and coolly persuasive. This was demanding, sudden, and selfish. He left her no room for response, all she could do was try and match his pace. Kid turned, carrying her inside with no brain cells to care and no hands to do anything about shutting the door.

Liz vaguely realized they were moving, managed to grab fistfuls of his shirt and pull him closer. Even as the room spun from the sensations racking her system Liz wondered how he could possibly stand strait let alone walk to the stairs with his eyes closed and carry her up the two flights. It wasn't fair…

A moan that might have embarrassed her if she could feel anything but electricity escaped her lips as Kid's teeth ran across her neck and collarbone.

Somewhere between the top of the stairs and the bedroom a bit of panic bubbled up nastily into Liz's chest. Not because she wasn't enjoying herself, but because Kid was still leading the charge.

Liz wanted control, and a tiny warning always sprang up in the back of her mind when she didn't have it. She tried in vain to disrupt Kid's focus, nibbling his ears usually did the trick, but not today—not now.

Her hands left his shirt, cupped his face as she tried to maneuvered him to kiss her again. When he obliged, kissing her long and deep, Liz thought she was in command—until she realized the kiss was still his. With a quick bite he left her mouth again, skimming down her jaw, drinking deep in her scent.

She tried moving her body but he held her fast. How was she letting him get away with this? The buzzing in her ears reminded Liz she was still just a slave to her own pleasure—completely at his mercy.

Tilting her head back in frustration Liz drank in the image of the man she loved: His jet black hair with its quirky upward ends tangled in her fingers, mismatched bangs spilling over his eyes. A strong, sharp chin she couldn't see skimmed between her breasts as he lay kisses over her heart.

She closed her eyes with a resolved to let the situation slip through her hands. Just this once. Kid wouldn't realize it but she bent her lips to kiss the side of his head in forgiveness before rendering all control to him.

With absolute precision Kid lowered Liz smoothly to the red satin couch because their bed was still five long strides away—and he just didn't have any more patience.

He knelt beside her on the floor, long torso bent over hers in a more princely image than he cared to realize.

Her hands slipped to his cloths again, and through a dizzying kiss he realized she was trying to remove them. The hand running down her hip caught both of hers and pinned them above her head without a break in rhythm.

Liz found the craving to look into Kid's eyes pulsing stronger and stronger inside her heart until it almost hurt.

As if the same sensation was growing in him as well Kid granted her wish, pulling away to drink in the sight of her flushed face and rarely messy hair.

Both Meister and Weapon held very still, only the sound of heavy breathing accompanied them as blue and gold paralyzed their opposite.

They'd wanted a moment, and received an immeasurable amount of frozen time.

Liz lay on the deep red couch, legs splayed haphazardly; only one arm still captive, the other wrapped around Kid's shoulders live a vice. His own free hand held her cheek: fingers tangled in the golden locks at the back of her neck, thumb stopped in the middle of soft caress.

Was it five minutes, or five seconds that passed?

Liz finally broke the paradox, red lips curved in a smile as her hand slipped down Kid's neck—snagging a finger through the loop of his tie.

He wouldn't stop her this time.

As she pulled smoothly at the tie he leaned down to her again, now meeting her with a kiss so milky and sweet it sent a different kind of heat pooling through Liz, curling her toes and melting any insecurity she still clung to.

Limp. Later Liz would realize he'd turned her completely limp.

"Liiiiiz!" A loud banging on wall was like gunfire, sending both their hearts jumping high. "Gotta get to work!"

Anybody but Patty would have been shot for interrupting this moment.

The blonde woman groaned, but called to her sister "Be there in a sec!"

She sat slowly, placed one last, sweet kiss on Kid's nose.

They still had to pack, eat, and leave before sundown, and time wasn't going to stop for just because theirs had.

"You can kiss when we get back!" Frustration had Patty tapping her foot impatiently as she waited for the pair to unlock their tangled limbs and hurry up.

Liz bit down on a laugh, flashed shiny blues at Kid and lifted herself from the couch as gracefully as possible while her head was still buzzing.

"To be continued." He announced quietly with a quick clearing of his throat. Kid worked to button his black shirt back into place, hoping desperately Liz didn't pick up on the faint blush decorating his cheeks.

….

Two hours of flight on Beelzebub later the trio stood on the battlegrounds from the previous day.

Kid watched the numbers spin madly on the device in his hand. When the meter settled on 15.3 the device became a compass, seeking out the spiritual wavelength it just got a lock on.

"This way this way!" Patty chanted as she hung over Kid's shoulder.

Liz eyed what could only be described as a digital bloodhound skeptically. As she and her sister flipped back into their gun forms she hoped for Stein's sake his new invention was more genius than crackpot.

….

The sun had long since drifted away, and the scent of a cold eastern ocean began to tinkle their noises. The wind whipping through their cloths became salty and almost violent.

"I really hope we won't have to fly over that…" Liz lamented, already weary from being in gun form too long.

"The readings are going berserk." Kid brought the demon skateboard to a smooth stop, his eyes flickered between the device and the environment around them. His arm swept regally over the landscape, calculating eyes watched the meter sputter and spike between three and single digit numbers.

When it settled the pointer suggested a seaside raven, so deep even the moon couldn't shine far beyond the first few feet near the top.

Patty whistled, Liz whimpered about ghosts, and Kid pondered whether it would be better to try their luck in the morning.

"I don't feel anybody down there…" Patty squinted as if it would help her see better in the dark.

"You don't have soul sensitivity either." Liz reminded her, to which her sister giggled goofy and replied; "Oh right!"

Beelzebub sank with slow stealth into the forest just ten feet away from their new target, though all three were anxious to stretch their legs after more than six hours of flying.

Once on the ground and released of their Weapon prisons Liz and Patty locked arms, took turns using the other's back as a balance board.

The younger sister didn't seem fazed by the long journey, but Kid could see the exhaustion and boredom in Liz's eyes. For a moment an old wound flared painfully in his chest, and a cold sweat broke over his palms. He ran them quickly over his pants but the feeling still lingered.

Watching Liz twist one last time before walking closer to the crevice, investigation and curiosity putting a small bounce in her step, Kid cursed himself for allowing such ridiculous fears to grip him again.

The threat of the girls leaving was long over, tied up neatly and tucked away. Liz's characteristic fits of displeasure shouldn't matter any more than Patty's suggestions they all move to Vegas and make a living dancing on stage.

Knowing that didn't make the dread choking him any less real.

Liz finished her assessment of the black cavern from a nice save "ghost proof" distance; officially deciding that going down there now would be suicide if they couldn't find a way to light it up.

"We should probably wait till tomorrow. Whatever's down there's not going anywhere, and if it is we can intercept…" When Liz shifted her gaze to meet Kid's the look of pain on his face startled her.

"What's wrong?" She took a hesitant step towards her Meister, watched him try to shake the emotion with limited success.

"Nothing." Kid rubbed his hand against his legs again, forced his lips into a smile that came off more as a weak smirk.

Liz didn't buy it. Her eyes bore deep, and she caught his face in well manicured hands. "Spill."

Kid waited for the heat to simmer out of her eyes, and when she didn't back down lowered his forehead to hers, eyes closing as the intimate contact smoothed some of his ruffles.

Liz didn't move, but looked up at her Technician through thick lashes, wanting desperately to know what he was thinking.

They stood silently under the moonlight, both parties wanting more or less the same thing yet never giving or getting it: understanding. Liz wished so badly to be inside his head, his heart, to know what troubled him and do something about it, while Kid begged the universe for Liz to stay ignorant of his lingering insecurities. It wasn't something he was proud of, and he refused to show her how fragile he still was.

Liz's hands stayed firm on his face though her fingers splayed and stretched to caress, carefully grabbing tighter hold on the back of his neck.

Patty entertained herself a few feet away by keeping playful watch on the crevice, allowing them the personal space she'd become accustomed to giving—and interrupting.

The tightness eased, and when he could breath again Kid drew Liz close, kissed her hair, then let go.

The smile he flashed her now was genuine, and convincing enough that the woman answered with her own. She could easily shoot him a look that might make him squirm enough to loosen his lips a little, but Liz decided not to. Instead she stifled her lack of satisfaction over how little she knew about Kid's troubles, opting for peace instead of conflict.

"Patty!"

Kid watched Liz bounce over to their youngest team member, and marveled for a moment over how a single woman could cause him so much turmoil and yet so much happiness in just under five minutes.

The moon laughed ominously overhead as it did every night, and Kid thought nothing of it.

He turned towards the woods behind him, wondering where the best vantage point would be to watch the comings and goings of the potential coven. Young Death doubted any Witches were inside now. Night was their hunting hour. If anything the trio would catch them on their return in the morning.

Kid turned again to the girls, words to call them to his side barely hung on his lips when the huge surge of Spirit Waves shot through the air. And just like that, two huge shadows flew at unbelievable speed over the rocks and caught Liz and Patty, dragging them screaming into the darkness.

"LIZ!"

The seconds it took to summon Beelzebub, climb aboard, and plunge into the sea cavern felt much too long. 'Have to hurry, I have to hurry or I'll loose them!'

Kid shot headfirst into the uncertainty with only Liz and Pattys' cries guiding him. His body scraped hard against jutting rocks, but this only annoyed him. 'I can't see **anything**!'

"PATTY! LIZ!"

Through her initial shock and struggling Liz could hear nothing beyond her own pulse. The slimy sloshing of the figure that held her, and the crash of waves against the cove eventually registered as her ears popped from the fast decent. When the massive body came to a student stop Liz's went cold and filled with dread. Now she heard Kid calling, her free hand flew out instinctively as she tried to warn him. "Stop! The floor—"

The echo of a bone breaking crash against rocky sand crushed her heart. "Kid!"

Beside her Patty struggled like a fish on a hook, more concerned by their danger than Kid's. She heard her sister—somewhere on the right—and stretched as far as her body could allow. "Liz!"

"Patty?" Frustrated by their blindness Liz grasped madly at the air to her left. The girl's hands nearly touched as they fought against the slimy bonds desperately.

A deep, female voice shook the walls, constricting tighter on the sisters as she addressed their Meister.

"**Best pick yourself up and hurry home little fool." **

Kid pushed himself up from the pebbles, ignoring the bruises, scrapes, and pain.

"Let them go!"

Eery laughter almost drowned the girl's weak cries to one another as they strained in the darkness for the other's fingers. If they could just reach—if they could just _breath_—they'd be ok!

"Patty…" Liz threw herself forward, at last grabbing Patty's small hand in her own.

Nothing happened.

"Transform!" She croaked, determined to get her sister out.

"I'm the better shot…" Patty smiled against the terrible pressure on her chest though she knew it wouldn't reach Liz.

"**You're hardly in a position to negotiate."**

Kid felt the huge presence towering over him, tried willing his eyes to adjust to the staggering absence of light. Somewhere in that massive body were his partners; afraid, and in pain.

Suddenly, starlight speckles pierced the darkness, the burst and ricochet of bullets gave Kid knew hope. He knew where they were now.

Picking Beelzebub from the rubble he aimed it as a weapon, fired alongside Patty—matching her target.

The screech of the Witch made them cringe and wish they could cover their ears though they didn't dare stop the barrage.

As she stumbling backwards the Squid body of a transformed Witch was revealed at last through silhouette.

Huge arms, wider than Patty was tall, flailed, knocking rocks and splashing water as the first burst of attack stunned her.

Like a harpy there was a human half, and it pleased Kid to watch the body squirm.

Anger brought the Squid out of shock, and in a single swift motion splayed all her limbs against the rocks—sweeping Kid away into the cliff with crushing force and nearly knocking Patty unconscious.

Kid gritted his teeth and fought with every ounce of strength to get out from the pressing arm threatening to crack the rest of his bones.

The younger Thompson could feel the darkness swirling behind her eyes. Before it took her under she looked for where she'd last heard Kid—and threw Liz to him. "Catch!" Patty used the last of her air to cry out, letting her Meister in on her plan in the only way she could before unconsciousness dragged her into even deeper darkness than that which hindered them now.

"_Patty no!"_ Liz panicked as she slipped from her sister's fingers. 'No I have to stay with her, I have to protect her!'

Kid caught a glimpse of his demon gun spinning through the air, struggled in vain to free a hand for her. He failed, but Liz transformed just in time, broke into an unsteady ready run.

Get to Kid, save her sister, save all their lives, Liz sprinted forward. It felt like a bad dream, the kind of dream where running was the only answer but all you could do was crawl.

"Kid—"

"**I think that's quite enough ridiculousness."**

Amproteuthsa the Witch was powerful, and cranky, and she was done playing children's games.

She plucked Liz from the air before the woman had a chance to reach her Meister—at the same time released Kid to stumble forward, watching in horror as his Weapon was taken from him again.

Why?

They were back to where they started. Nothing they did had changed anything. Except now Patty was unconscious.

Why where they so WEAK?

"**Don't worry." **The Witch's voice seemed almost calming as she held Liz high, beside her human head.

Kid saw in the moonlight the deep red hair, the sharp fangs of their adversary, and watched Liz come closer to the Witch than he should have ever allowed. 

"**You'll get them back…" **She ran a long pointed tongue across Liz's cheek, her fangs glistening. **"…once I'm done with them."**

Liz hissed, kicked hard with her legs and dug pointed fingernails into their enemy. Amproteuthsa snarled more in amusement or pity than pain. **"Want to play rough?"**

The tentacle holding Liz constricted sharply, making the blonde woman's ribs explode with fire. The pressure wouldn't to make her faint, but caused so much pain it took Liz every ounce of control not to scream.

"**I like it rough." **

Mockingly Amproteuthsa petted Liz's cheek, watched the woman fighting so hard she bit her own lip till it bled.

Liz wouldn't, _couldn't_, give this sadist the satisfaction…but GOD!

Huge golden eyes fixed on Liz, saw the single hot tear glimmer on her cheek, the smile of pleasure on their enemies face as the woman brought her face toward Liz.

In that moment Kid finally snapped.

Energy surged from his body, displacing sand and gravel around him in a spinning whirlwind. The Sanzu lines on his forehead pulsed to glow, the first connected, his eyes shone wild.

Kid charged the Witch, untapped power exploded from his fingers as he knocking her further onto the sandy beach with a punch so full of force it pushed even the waves back.

Fury was taking over, giving him strength he'd never tasted before. Kid could see clearly, yet his conscious mind was slipping away.

The Witch read this on his expression and tried to stifle her concern.

"**I'll kill them!"** The second line of Sanzu connected.

"**I'll kill them right n-aaaaaaaaah" **

Speed. He'd needed more speed, more power. Now he had both.

Seconds into the Witch's threat Kid extended his hands; flesh-stripping blast pierced the thick slimy skin of tentacles—severing them.

He barely noticed the ear-splitting howl of agony, the return attack of eight squid arms, or the broken curses directed at him. Kid's one and only focus was beating the living hell out of the creature who'd caused him so much grief.

Kid made a mad dash up the squirming body, each placement of his foot claimed the impact of a battering ram. Once face to face with the Witch his own style of combat came so furious it bordered on madness. While blue light and energy continued to glow from within the young Shinigami as he fought like hell, completely turning the tables.

The tentacles holding Liz and Patty fell to the sand with a boulder's weight. Release swamped Liz, but her greedy gasped for air only spurred more pain.

Flirting with unconsciousness and coughing violently she lifted her head. "Patty?"

Waves washed around her sister's body, tugging gently at the light blonde hair. "Patty!"

Yelling was just as bad as breathing.

Completely lost in his rage Kid pummels his enemy with pure Shinigami power, even as her towering figure falls, shrinks, he continues to beat her. He doesn't feel his fists connect, or the screaming protests of already broken bones in his left arm. Three black lines waver over his lips, not fully formed.

It's not until Liz calls out to him in a voice so faint she might have been across the bay that he stops, looks up from what he's done.

The power ebbs, the lines fade, and completely white eyes surrender the gold hidden beneath.

Very slowly he turns his head, his vision fuzzy not from rage but the unforgiving throb of sickness.

A tremor racked his spin as the broken arm flooded his system with long overdue pain. Legs shacking, he lifts himself from the water, takes an unsteady step towards the beach.

He heard coughing to his right, saw Liz crawling toward Patty.

Kid forced his reluctant body to stay up, to run.

Using his right arm Kid summoned his father and spoke in broken gasps: "Send help. Immediate medical treatment needed. Need local hospital, get Kim!"

The young shinigami cut his very concerned father off, closed the link as he sank to the ground, next to Patty and Liz.

He could see Patty breath, thank Father, she's still breathing, even if it's shallow and labored that was something.

A great, cowardly part of Kid dreaded what he would see if he really looked at Liz, but the broken man did so anyway.

Staring down at the one thing he cared about most in this world, seeing the tears in her eyes and the blood around her mouth from where she'd bit herself and coughed up mouthfuls numbed him almost completely. He didn't bother to thank anyone for that.

Like someone pulled the plug on him and Kid felt his energy simply drain out.

Collapsing into the shallow waters on his knees Kid drew the girls into his arms and held tight. The absolute anguish rolling off his left arm as he did was punishment for allowing his Weapons to suffer so completely.

Hating himself, Kid fought a new enemy as he strained to stay upright. He couldn't pass out now. He couldn't escape the pain yet. Damn it he needed to suffer!

"Stop it."

Was that scolding he heard in that soft voice?

Kid looked down to find the eyes of his Weapon staring daggers of a kind he wasn't expecting. She didn't hate him. She _loved_ him.

"Don't blame yourself. Don't fight it."

Her words took a good minute to sink in, it didn't ease his guilt, but Kid did allow himself to fall back into the water.

Liz's blood dripped on his cheek before the blonde head collapsed at his neck, and they all went under.

….

To be continued!

First off, our foster kitten thought you all should know this:

000000000000000009 t',,,,,,,, ````````````````````````nm hhhhh44y

I don't know what it means. It could be a cry for help, a warning the world will end…or she could be a rabid Kiz/Liz shipper too.

Actually I really do owe the Kid/Liz shippers an apology. While Kid and Liz are my favorite couple they really haven't gotten much screen time in this fic b/c the whole reason I started writing Moments in Time was…actually…something I thought up for Soul and Maka. But now I've worked all three of our couples into that plot, so I'll be doing my best to do them each some justice.

I'm really looking forward to the reviews for this one! My heart goes all fluttery when I read them, especially when people say they can't wait for more. I get determined not to let them down!

Actually, you can thank Fawnspots for really getting me back into this! A few weeks ago a review came out of nowhere and inspired me to take it up again.

Anyway, enough rambling. If you're still reading, thank you so much. I hope not to disappoint as the story comes to the finale.


	15. The woman in the reflection

**Thank you to gin-kyo for really making me think hard about what I wrote in the last chapter. I'm so grateful you all are enjoying this story, but I sometimes need you to remind me that I haven't explained things as well as I should have. Sometimes there's a little miscommunication between my brain and the paper, and other times I just write from the heart and don't analyze it enough for others to understand. **

**Anywho, **

**Enjoy!**

.*.*.

White light shone mercilessly into Liz's eyes, the neon buzz of them drilled at her already pounding head, and feeling came back to her limbs in slow pickling waves. Where was she? Where were her partners? What happened to the enemy?

Though these worries flared up much faster than Liz could comprehend answers, the strong scent of ammonia spoke of a hospital, and she relaxed a little. More vision came, though the room was just bubbles of blur and light. As more focus came she felt two small, warm hands pressing against her diaphragm. Gentle magic soaked over her bruised body, and though her mind was still as fuzzy as her sight Liz knew the person healing her was Kim.

Her patient moved slightly, and a low groan told Kim that Liz was finally returning to the world of the conscious. "Hey, she's coming out of it." Eight hours ago the pink haired Witch had been called halfway across the country to bring her friends back from a place of dark, dangerous injury. Now she smiled with relief and turned to her the disoriented woman.

The Liz winced against the neon lights, but kept her eyes open to flick back and forth to either side.

"Don't worry Liz, Patty's doing just fine." Kim motioned to Liz's left, knowing what she would be looking for.

Liz swallowed hard against what she just realized was a horribly dry mouth. She could feel her sister's presence just a few feet away, but not Kid.

"Kid." She croaked. "Where's Kid?"

Kim exchanged a cautious glance with the nurse standing by her side. "Don't worry about him right now, we've got to get you stable."

The blond woman would have started barking demands if the dull throb of pain didn't coax her back into the darkness.

.*.

The second time Liz woke in that hospital bed it was very dim. The scrapes along her body pulsed with dull discomfort, and despite Kim's magic her entire upper half felt so sore it might be caving in.

At the very least she had Patty's hand in her own, their beds pressed together to make a double, and she got to see the last moments of sunset paint a pretty halo along her sister's ruffled hair.

In an attempt she knew was stupid Liz pushed herself up with her elbows, fighting back a wince and moan as the pressure on her abdomen got worse. Weak, probably from hunger, she slid back into the pillows and fumbled for the call button.

A nurse with long legs and a small pretty face answered. Before she could open her pixy mouth Liz shot out; "Where's our Meister?" The nurse's eyes flickered uncomfortably, but her pretty little smile never changed. "Let me get your doctor."

Maybe it was the headache, or the growing feeling that she was being suffocated, but Liz's temper took a turn for snappy. "He's a twenty two year old boy with black and white hair. Where is he?"

Red heels clicked as the woman turned to call someone else to deal with the growing mess. "You'll have to wait for the doctor."

"Why can't you tell me?" Now Liz did sit up, glared daggers at the incompetent fool before her. "Look, he's **family** ok?"

Nancy didn't answer, chose to stick her head out the door and motion sharply for someone unseen.

"I don't care what your rules are, it's a yes or no; Is he alright or isn't it?"

Please let him be ok.

Kim jogged in, and Liz new right away the cautious look in her eyes meant bad news. The harsh remark in her throat sank like a lead ball into her empty stomach.

_Please. _

The pink haired Witch placed a healing hand over Liz's shoulder, and their eyes locked.

Pausing briefly, she sucked in a breath. "Liz, when we found you and Patty, Kid….he wasn't there."

Shaking blue eyes flared with hot, desperate disbelief. "What do you mean he wasn't there?"

"We've got people looking for him, but his soul residue ends out in the ocean."

Her fists balled tight, and though she knew it wasn't Kim's fault she spit angry words into the air. "What are you trying to say? That's he's—what, just _gone_? Residue trails don't just STOP."

Liz threw the covers from her recovering body… "You're not looking hard enough!" …tried to get up with useless, shaking limbs.

The blonde fighter didn't even get her feet on the ground before Kim's hand hardened and pushed her back into bed. "We'll find him."

A tense moment passed between the women as Liz struggled against the steady hand, still convinced she would be able to get out of bed and find her Meister. Eventually Liz's realization of her own frailty, coupled with the patient sadness on her friend's face sapped away all her rage, turning it into cruel, sticky, sickening panic. When the trail of a person's soul disappeared beyond traceability one of the possibilities was death. Liz refused to believe the son of a Shinigami would die so easily, and she fought like hell against the horror threatening to dislodge more of her composure.

Kim could hear that fight in her friend's trembling voice when she said; "You have to find him, he's out there. I _saw_ him, he was **fine**." Hearing the desperation in her own voice only added to the hot ball in her throat breaking her voice. "He was fine…"

The Witch opened her mouth to offer some small condolence, but another hand took hold of Liz's arm, squeezed it gently, and both women looked down to see Patty's big blue eyes staring stoically up at Liz.

The older blonde's palms began to sweat, the ball in her throat continued to grow hotter, bigger, but she swallowed it down. Taking her sister's hand again, knowing she couldn't muster a smile, Liz instead settled onto Patty's pillow, let their forehead's touch.

Wherever Kid was, he'd be ok. That was something they would just have to believe.

.*.*.

Kid did not wake to a bright light like his partner, but a kind of decadent dimness only fire and candle could produce. It bounced off the etched walls of the cave beautifully, but Kid didn't notice that.

You wouldn't either if you found yourself tied to a rock slab table in the cold of a strange place.

Kid shrugged against his bonds, but quickly found for every ounce of resistance he put out the ropes crushed tighter around his body. Pain seared through his broken left arm, and the young Death God became very still as he realized magic involved.

The tap of flat bottom shoes announced the Squid Witch as she entered her den, leaned over the trapped Shinigami with a horrible smirk across her lips. "Comfortable?"

Before he could come up with a remark a terrifying thought crossed the young Reaper's mind. Where were Liz and Patty?

Golden eyes scanned the cave but he didn't see or hear anyone else.

"Where are they?"

Her fingers stroking his hair felt cold and clammy. "I wonder. Perhaps they got swept out with the tide while you lay sleeping?"

Kid's eyes lit up, his body jerked in response even as the constriction tightened.

Intense strength let him rip his right arm free, grab the Witch's head and turn the tables on her. "Tell me!"

She growled, hissed her words. "I can crush your body in _seconds_."

"My body can heal. Your skull probably won't." Everything about the man dripped poison in that moment, and for once he felt an unsteady wave of doubt sweep the twisted creature he held taunt beneath his long fingers.

Bright red eyes twitched with anger and a struggle for control, her breath left in short puffs. "I don't have your Guns…The other Reapers took them."

The gravity of her voice let him believe her words, though he certainly wasn't about to release his grip.

Kid never took his eyes off the Witch, but apparently the rope didn't need any commands. Before the air could begin to settle the golden cord shot out, wrapped around his wrist, squeeze the pressure point to release his grip and slammed it back down at his side.

Frustration boiled inside Kid like a pressure cooker, yet only his hands moved-balling into fists. He couldn't afford any more movement.

The Witch stumbled backwards and raised a hand to strike before some unseen reminder stopped her. Her anger teemed; ready to explode, but like Kid she managed to contain it. The woman straitened, recomposed herself, and bent for a wooden ladle and ceramic pot at her feet.

"I'd kill you for your insolence, arrogant Reaper, if our Mistress didn't request a word with you."

She drew water from the pot, splashed it into the air over Kid's legs. He didn't feel a single drop, but watched it collect to form a puddle. One long black eyebrow went up, and though he couldn't help comparing this puddle to his father's communication mirror Kid wasn't about to relax.

The droplets settled with a near metallic sheen before a beautiful woman took center stage.

Kid became very still, and when her thin lips turned to smile quietly at him an unusual sensation swarmed the man. Never pity the enemy. That was rule #1. Or, it probably was. Next to "always trust your partner". But this woman—no, this _Witch_ looked so sad, yet so content that even the Son of Death felt his heart sway just a little.

She had the brightest green eyes he'd ever seen, but aside from the gradient blue of her dress everything else about the Witch was pale. Snowy hair, ivory skin, even bright white thick eyelashes. Those thin lips moved to speak, their subtle pink color popped like a flower breaking the ice in spring against her lifeless cheeks. "Your Weapons are safe, healing, and Shinigami will soon send them home."

A thousand questions flared up, but Kid kept quiet, waiting for the best moment to strike.

"You may not realize it now…but the safest thing for those girls is to be away from you. For the moment."

Kid's lips twitched, and repressing his response was becoming harder.

"The ropes holding you? Capable of crushing a mountain…if one was ever made long enough to wrap around such a landscape. Able to stop a team of horses in their tracks." She motioned to with a long finger to the bondage. "You were able to get an arm out, and if not for your broken bones you may have torn them off by now."

Althear paused, her little smile grew as she watched the realization and confusion swim in Kid's golden eyes. "You failed to realize you were still using such incredible force, did you?"

Kid glared up at the white Witch, trying to sound strong and diplomatic. "First, why would my father send my partners back to Death City? They'll look for me until they discover this location." 

Althear's eyes graced the forgotten Witch host in the corner. "Anthy's magic is to 'conceal.' Not even that fiery, clever friend of yours could detect us under her cover."

How did she know about Maka?

The line under her eyes crinkles when her face light with amusement. "Besides, I've already told your father of your situation."

"Why would my father accept the advice of a Witch?" Kid snapped.

Kim was one thing, but this woman was clearly another. Though she didn't look more than thirty she presence, even from a puddle, felt ancient. Ancient Witches were not only incredibly powerful, but incredible trouble. Medusa had taught him that.

Was that more pain he saw in her eyes?

It must have been, because the smile faded slightly. "I'm in his debt."

So it was a matter of control…Yet another thing about his father Kid would have to dig up when he got home.

Whatever melancholy Kid's question drew disappeared as Althear started on her new line of attack. "Shinigami may know you are safe, but your Weapons do not." Her haunting voice melted with honey now. "Naturally, they will assume the worst while no one informs them of your real situation. Haven't you always wondered, in the depth of your heart, what they would do if the option to find another Meister presented itself? Stay a week…rest, hone your new strength…and reward yourself with the answer to one of the many questions that plague you."

Kid mulled this quietly, and the Witch seemed perfectly content to stand there, watching him.

It frustrated Kid that his first comment made her laugh: "And what exactly can _you_ teach me in a week's time?"

.*.*.

It must have been close to two in the morning when Liz managed to sneak away from Patty, the night nurse, and hospital security to jack a car and hit the road.

Her body still hurt horribly, but the roar was becoming as dull as the waves beating against the rocks a hundred feet below.

She stayed a cautious distance away from the cavern and it's darkness, but tired eyes studied the blue waters hopefully.

If Kid was out there she would find him. She had to.

Sucking in a fast breath of icy east coast air, Liz began to look for the path of least resistance down the cliff.

What she found was a bit more forgiving than the jagged edges scoured the rest of the rock, but not by much. Twice her hands slipped and she swore loudly as the first layer of skin came off.

The third time she was lucky to land on her butt four feet down, legs splayed outward childishly on the rock that saved her life.

'I should have just driven…' She sulked, pale head turned skyward to gage how far she'd already come. At roughly the halfway mark, it would be too much trouble to go back up. She would have to press on, be brave, suck it up, and get back to saving her stupid Meister's life.

.*.

"Alright, this isn't so bad." Very tired, very much in pain, and just a little too hopeful, Liz peered over the last big alcove that hung two stories above the sandy beach. "Kid could jump from here." She mused.

A few more feet of climbing and the last leg of her journey would be a snap. Liz could jump from ten feet if she flipped, and in her eagerness she didn't consider her weak condition.

Liz landed unsteady on the sand below, but eventually settled her balanced, cursing her own frailty. How long would it take to get over this nonsense?

She pushed on, refusing to acknowledge the wobble and tremor in her legs. 'Just imagine Kid, out there somewhere on his own.'

Fighting eyes swept the water line, searching for any signs of a body. Of course there was nothing, but Liz knew there wouldn't be.

She drew a huge, slow breath, closed her eyes, and gathered energy.

Sight and residue detectors wouldn't find her Meister…

Liz exhaled, caught her focus, and energy spiked around her, swirled, tossing the sand and waves as she stepped into the chilled water.

She would call to Kid in a way only the Thompson Sisters could.

Taking one last short breath, Liz letting it all go.

Resonance.

Far over the water she felt her consciousness fly, even down below the waves she reached for Kid, waiting for some small tug of response.

The wind came back to her without even a whisper of Kid. Determined, Liz inched into the water, her toes splayed in the sea foam, felt the cold sand sink under that small weight. She did her best to Resonate alone, wading further into the water every now and then. Still nothing.

_Please Kid_.

When Liz felt the waves push her, lift her off the sandy floor she knew it was time turn back…but refused. 'More power', she pleaded, 'I need more power'.

Temperamental was the sea, and in that moment unforgiving. A rare wave gathered out at sea, came over Liz' head and dunked her under. Strong current pulled her along, deeper, but she struggled and broke free. Eyes now wide open, stinging with salt she waded for shore. Her limbs were lead, and the lonely Resonance had taken most of what she'd recovered that day. Liz kicked and thrashed her way to a mermaid's rock, dragged herself out of the water and lingered there, gasping for air.

It was time to give up Liz finally admitted, feeling foolish and low as she lay on the uncomfortable rock—promising herself it was just for today. Tomorrow, she'd be back with Patty. Together they could project their wavelength twice as far, twice as potent.

They would find Kid.

These hot, bitter tears? They weren't grief, just frustration. Her Meister was alive. Shinigami couldn't die…right?

.*.

Thousands of miles away Shinigami watched two sets of events unfold; Liz's struggle against the elements and his Son's against the idea of accepting help from Witches. He called the hospital, told them where to find the eldest Thompson. She would probably be on high security watch now, but it didn't matter, they were already booked on the next plane home.

Kid was another matter, because this was a lesson his Son would have to learn on his own.

Some part of the powerful god wished Althear had given him the link to more than the two-way mirror. While their view was the same, and he could see his son, see the effect her words had on him, he itched to see the Witch as well.

Their friendship was just a distant dream, but even the Lord of Death was allowed some moments to brood and stew in his own nostalgia.

She'd probably done it on purpose, maybe her for own sake, or to spite him. He never could control her, or figure out what she was thinking.

He hoped very much that Kid would come to trust her, that maybe she could be a part of their lives.

The god chuckled, knowing that wasn't possible. You can't cage a wild animal.

.*.

Liz refused to believe that Lord Death would abandon his own son. Every day she called, asked the same questions a different way, badgered the Reaper till he blocked her calls. How could you block calls from a _mirror_ anyway?

Six days never felt so long, or so miserable as these. Two were spent physically fighting the orders of Shinigami, half of the third on a plane. The rest was an endless string of sunrises, sunsets, and sleepless nights. Yesterday their hospital nurse was sent home, and Patty took up the cooking again, even attempted laundry.

Liz did little beyond stay in bed, either yelling at their bouncy boss or wallowing in what remained of Kid's scent.

But now that the nurse was gone, nothing could stop her from storming the castle in person.

The tall woman stood in her bathroom, a determined scowl across her face made her look fiery and brave—she would need that face if she was about to go yell at her employer, god, and possible future father in law. She was going to get some damn _answers. _No mater what.

Her triumphant mood wasn't meant to last, for the truth showed in her fingers, the way they trembled undoing the buttons of Kid's shirt.

Those tremors made the process almost impossible, frustrating her to a point where screaming and throwing her hands up seemed the best response. Liz became very still after that, for the first time since the battle she allowed herself to go completely quiet. So when she looked into the mirror she didn't see a strong, confident woman. She saw a senseless, grieving widow wearing her lover's cloths.

Her hair hadn't been done in days, she'd lost weight, and there were new lines and dark shadows beneath her eyes.

On the brink of resentful tears Liz tore out of the borrowed nightgown, shoved her head into a fresh T and stormed down the stairs.

If this was all just some lesson for Kid, some trial he had to pass or whim of detour then she refused to be the victim of it. She wasn't about to cry for a man who could very well just be testing the limits of his recovery time—which was exceedingly good by the way.

'Don't be weak.' She told herself. 'Demand to know what that flamboyant Reaper is thinking!'

"Patty?" She called from the stairs. "We're going out! Let's see what Shinigami has to say for himself."

Turning the corner into the kitchen the two sisters collided with a hard 'thud.'

"Sorry! Are you dressed?" The taller blonde craned her neck to the left, trying to judge her sister's appearance, but Patty stayed still.

Most of their friends knew her as a bubbly airhead…but what they didn't realize was that Patty knew exactly what she was doing, and indulged in childish behavior even knowing the image it gave her. Truthfully she was very observant, incredibly smart, and simply chose to dawdle in her own world, rather than participate in 'reality.'

So, yes, she saw what this past week had done to her sister, knew why, but could not comprehended.

Kid was important to her too, he and Liz were the pillars of this incredible fantasy life. She would risk her life for his safety. But she just didn't have the fight in her that Liz did, didn't feel it deep in her core. Knowing that Kid was not upstairs fretting over senseless paperwork didn't leave her shaken, wandering the halls like a zombie.

She hated, hated,_ hated_ seeing Liz this way. Kid had been gone almost a week, and it was time to do something.

So she took her sister's hands, looked right into those tired blue eyes and smiled. "Let's have breakfast."

Liz looked stunned, and didn't object when Patty lead her into the dinning room, settled her at the table, then turned to the oven to retrieve some of the pumpkin apple pancakes waiting in the warmth.

Patty took control, leading her sister in light conversation, made sure she ate, then coaxed her into the bath. Despite the seriousness of her efforts she smiled, enjoying her living doll, enjoyed being the 'responsible' one for once.

Maybe it was the sudden burst of maturity Liz saw in Patty, or the fact that she was just honestly exhausted. Either way, those melt in your mouth pancakes, and the half hour she spent soaking in scented water did more to fill the gap in Liz's heart than all the angry calls she'd made that week.

When she came out Patty was waiting on the bed, tucked the light satin sheets gently around her sister when she slipped under the covers, then sat close by, brushing Liz's damp hair.

How many days had it been since she'd seen that sincere pull of her sister's lips?

Patty didn't want to upset that happiness, but it had to be said, and Liz would never really relax until someone said it. So she took her time, enjoyed the simple contact a few more minutes, then finally spoke;

"You love Kid soooo much. More than me, more than anybody I think. So um…if something bad really did happen to him? You'd know. In your gut. So don't worry too much. And…I don't mind…I know you worry a lot about me too…but I really don't mind."

Liz's face wasn't serene with pleasure anymore, instead she watched the window and wondered what to do with Patty's words.

The rhythm of the brush against her hair hadn't changed, but something in the air hand. Some uncomfortable little feeling that made every other sound in the giant house disappear.

"I love Kid, and I love you, but it's different than what you've got…I know that, but what I mean is…if it takes him a long time to come home we'll be fine just the two of us. We'll be sad, but we'll be fine. Because I love you."

Liz pushed away the covers, threw herself on her little sister and snuggled her tightly down into the sheets, crying silently with an awkward smile.

.*.

The laughing sun had just started its descent when Kid opened his front door, wondering if he would startle the girls.

He could feel Liz upstairs, Patty in the living room.

Kid and the Witches hadn't noticed it in the cave, but as soon as he took flight that morning the young Reaper realized he now had a hauntingly accurate ability to sense souls now. Later, he'd want to talk to Maka and Chrona, compare notes on what they saw and felt.

Before he could call out Patty came skittering around the corner, and when she saw him

his younger weapon froze awkwardly mid step, with the widest eyes he'd ever seen.

"YOU…with the FACE!"

The young man didn't say anything, but grabbed the girl ferociously and hugged her tight. Patty's cup of tea clattered to the floor when she sank into the chilly embrace of her Meister. He was **home**, he was safe, and the relief of that hit her like an unexpected brick wall. Not that brick walls are ever expected.

Kid heard a distinct sniffle up the stairs, his head jerked up, and he saw the red eyes, wrinkled cloths, and undone hair of a woman who probably hadn't slept much in days.

He watched her very carefully, noting every detail.

She saw him, but her eyes didn't go wide. She didn't drop her tissue, fuss or fiddle with her hair or outfit—

Patty beamed up at Liz, smiling wide and happy as she knowingly stepped to the side.

It only took her a few seconds to absorb what she saw, but when the initial shock was over Liz ran full speed down the stairs, almost flew the distance between the last step and Kid's arms. From the feel of her she hadn't been eating much either.

Her legs wrapped around his waist, her hands grabbed his head and she kissed him hard. Kid groaned from the pressure she put on his bruises, but when he broke away to explain she covered his face with a heartbreaking mixture of kisses and sobs. "Why?" She managed between gasping breaths. "If you were alright why didn't you _calI?_" Somewhere between 'why' and 'call' she must have realized how mad she was because Liz started pounding Kid's chest with her palm like it would help him understand.

Kid grabbed his weapon's hands in his right hand, touched her gently, gingerly, with his left. His eyes bore into hers as he answered truthfully. "I wanted

to see this expression."

Tears spilled over her cheeks as her eyes twisted further with anger at the matter-of-fact way he said it, and then, in just a small beat, it was all gone. Grief, fury, confusion, all replaced by exhaustion.

Kid kissed her forehead softly, lingered there a moment as she slid back down to the ground. Once her feet were on the floor the Shinigami reached again for Patty, and hugged both his girls tightly.

The trio stood in their doorway, unaware of the heat or the fact that their front door was still open and everyone mad enough to be out walking could probably see them.

After one turmoil filed week their family was back together, and nothing else really mattered.

A sharp _beepbeep_ startled the group, and Patty jumped to give Kid a noisy kiss on the cheek before she ran to the kitchen spouting something about pie.

Liz and Kid were left alone in the hall, and for a while it was absolutely silent. The young Reaper thought back to the last serene moment they had on the cliff, settled in a much less desperate embrace. What he was thinking at that time, his insecurities, doubts, and darkest fears got put to the test today. The girls hadn't left, they waited for him, welcomed him home.

And, he thought, they hadn't fallen to pieces. Neither had he. This week apart was the longest they'd been separated since Noah's book, and it proved that they had grown stronger, less dependant. Most impotantly, the love was still there.

On his ride home Kid ended up thinking a great deal about time; how a week, or a month to him just flew by without much consequence. Before Liz helped him change, spending the day focused on just one thing didn't seem such a silly idea. There would be hundreds more days to do everything else.

But time passed more quickly for the girls. They grew bored easily, and Patty always lost her focus halfway through a project, so would Liz sometimes.

His week had felt like a day, one long, torturous day that never ended.

The black haired man brushed a hand up his partner's side, twisted it in her hair, and drew her eyes to look at him.

She looked so tired, yet so full of hope and life. What did his own look like?

Liz offered a quiet smile, came up on her toes and simply pressed her lips against Kid's.

Three days without sleep and one very long six hour flight were taking their toll, and Kid wanted nothing more than to sink to that kiss, crawl into bed, and dissolve into the earthy scent and soft body of his weapon. Kid's hands slipped from her shoulders, caught her around the waist, and he soaked in the warmth that spread over him now that she was in his arms.

When his head began to spin Kid drew away, and the two shared a quiet smirk before he stated; "You haven't been sleeping."

Liz shook her head, dragged a hand through his bangs. "You either."

"No." Her heart shuttered when he took her hand, brushing his lips over the knuckles. "Rest with me?"

No woman could refuse a request like that while her legs weren't sure if they had bones or jelly.

Like before, Liz struggled at first with the idea of being so flustered, so self-conscious. But when Kid smiled, a half childlike grin, led her up the stairs with a slight limp in his step and hair nearly as messy as her own Liz relaxed. Life had taught her to be cautions, to keep her hands and head in control, but with Kid…she could learn to let go. Be free. She _would_ learn to.

Upstairs Kid took a very fast shower, while Liz pondered what to do with his hopelessly damaged suit.

Dressing again his typical button up and pants, Kid promised himself that when they woke again he would tell Liz what happened. She and Patty deserved to know.

That resolve, and any other loose thoughts left his head when he saw Liz, her back to him as she drew the curtains closed.

He honestly had indented to sleep, but seeing Liz in the window, the sun glowing in her hair that way it did that drove him absolutely insane, much less innocent thoughts crept in.

It occurred to him that the white cotton bathrobe might be the only thing she had on, leaving his fingers itching to remove it.

He moved to her, embracing her from behind, drew her down to the bed on his lap.

That warning flared briefly before the sensation of Kid's lips on her neck switched it off. Hungry hands skimmed her sides, arms, hovered over the crease of the robe, and Liz reminded herself of the resolution she made minutes before.

She could trust Kid.

Like a cat stretching Liz molded onto her Meister, twisted just slightly to tease him with a better view and to offer the first kiss.

She could put herself in his hands; let him have pieces of her that no other person had ever held. Not the men on the street, on the parents she barely remembered.

Kid savored the sensation as his hand brushed aside the robe, felt the smooth, milky skin beneath.

The moan of appreciation from her partner was the best compliment, it turned her parted lips into an arrogant grin and prompted Liz to nip playfully.

She would give herself, but so would he.

Her mouth was unbelievably hot, and why wasn't his brain working properly? All the preferences he'd discovered over the past year scrambled when the woman in his hands twisted in his lap for full assault.

Their shared embarrassment, and vulnerability made them equals. A god and a mortal, rich and stay, controlled and wild, were now just a man and a woman.

Liz's heat spread from every whisper of her fingertips, and though her determination to stun him was relentless, but Kid eventually rose from the haze she'd throw him into. To the young god this wasn't a game, he wasn't thinking, just listening to the needs of his body.

He found his hands frozen in her hair and in the belt loop of the robe. Trying to make up for the lost moments, the hand in her hair skimmed along her jaw, the other slipped lower to massage gently the leg, hip, and lean muscles of Liz's side.

He felt her react, watched her purr, flinch, or melt into every experimental action, discovered himself doing the same.

Kisses turned to biting hunger, touch became an addiction not even the absolute contact of body to body could satisfy. Liz was the first to draw away, and even as Kid tried to pull her down to him again her hands tugged at his black shirt.

The Reaper's breath caught in his throat to see the look in her eyes as they danced with his own for just a moment before those big lashes came down and her gaze fell.

Kid rose to meet his partner, lifted his arms as the shirt slipped over his head. Then wrapped his arms around her shoulders, kissed her deeply. The hint of tension he felt a second ago disappeared, and the man pulled the cotton robe gently from her shoulders.

Her body tightened, but didn't shy away—she didn't meet his eyes either. Was she waiting for something? Something he had to do?

Liz's hands skimmed up Kid's chest, lingering over the sculpted muscle, silently admiring the surprising strength she knew lay beneath.

Unlike Soul and Black Star, Kid healed so quickly he didn't often retain scars to show for all his injuries—a fact that left Liz feeling more than a little disappointed, and very selfish.

Yet an oddity remained three inches below his right shoulder, a single, awkward bump of rough that contrasted with the rest of Kid's smooth skin.

Liz ran a hand over that scar, and Kid swore he could feel her love and anxiety flow into him as delicate fingers pressed into his chest.

This was the wound that opened the door for them, and though she would never look back on his pain fondly, Liz loved that scar. It made him more human, somehow more real. That would be their last barrier; their uncertainty not of each other's love but of all the crummy details of their very different existences.

Naked skin touched, and the sensation was like nothing Kid had ever expected. If the hunger in his stomach wasn't still so strong he might have lingered there, quite content to simply exist with the woman in his arms.

But this need wasn't the kind that could simmer away, this brief moment of quiet had only excited the boiling blood between them.

Liz settled over Kid's lap again, fully aware of how far down the storm they had spun. Her head felt like this huge black space that only a fraction of her thoughts could fill. Pleasure spiked, and her body seemed both magnified and disconnected.

They'd come to the brink, the point of no return, as if they had no choice. Needy hands, teeth, touch, and mouths, full exploration and no restrictions left them slaves to sensation.

Liz heard Kid breath in raspy confession "I love you."

The words were mumbled, barely coherent, but they didn't need to be. Liz answered, their hearts pressed together, beating two very different rhythms, as the two existences finally slipped into one "Always."

*.*

Liz woke shivering hours later. Her first thought was that a freak desert monsoon had blown threw, bringing with it a dramatic chill their air conditioner didn't account for. Yet when her heavy head lifted from Kids, the air around her felt just as lukewarm as it always did. She placed a hand on his forehead, and it was like touching ice.

"Kid?"

.*.

**That's all for now, but I hope you're still excited for the rest. More characters are coming back next chapter! **

**And uuuh I feel like such a creeper reading the comments on gin-kyo_deviantart's illustrations for this fic but it's so addicting! **

**Oh, and I haven't given up on re-writing the other chapters…I'm just really busy working on a documentary. By day at least! *batman music* **


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